This is an unpublished translation of the Qur'an into Russian, made from André du Ryer’s mid-17th-century French translation L’Alcoran de Mahomet (1647) arguably by one of the Postnikov brothers.
Alkoran o Magomete, ili Zakon turetskii. Perevedenyi s frantsuzskogo iazyka na rossiiskii. Napechatalsia poveleniem Tsarskago Velichestva v Sankt-Peterburgskoi tipografii 1716 godu, v mesiatse dekemvrii
Alkoran about Mahomet or the Turkish creed. Translated from French into Russian. Printed by the order of Tsarist Majesty in the St. Petersburg printing house in 1716, in the month of December
Russian
1716
Qur'an
Prose
Yes
No
L’Alcoran de Mahomet, translaté d’arabe en françois par le Sieur du Ryer, Sieur de la garde Malezair
This translation of the Qur’an, made from André du Ryer’s mid-17th-century French translation, L’Alcoran de Mahomet (1647), is now generally agreed to be the first complete translation into Russian. Although many scholarly works give Piotr Pos(t)nikov as the author of this Russian translation, this fact has been debated in recent literature.
Obstoiatel'noe i podrobnoe opisanie zhizni lzheproroka Magomeda
Obstoiatel'noe i podrobnoe opisanie zhizni lzheproroka Magomeda: S tochnym pokazaniem vremeni i mesta ego rozhdeniia, svoistv i pervonachal'nago sostoianiia; nachala, prichin, uspekhov i rasprostraneniia vymyshlennago im obmana, so mnogimi drugimi osoblivostiami; Sluzhashchee ob"iasneniem na mnogiia mesta ego Al Korana. Sobrannoe iz dostoverneishikh arabskikh, evreiskikh, khaldeiskikh, grecheskikh i latinskikh pisatelei slavnym doktorom Prido
A detailed and thorough description of the life of the false prophet Mahomet: With an accurate indication of the time and place of his birth, properties and initial condition; the beginning, causes, successes and the spread of his fictitious deception, with many other features; Serving as an explanation for many places of his Al Quran. Collected from the most reliable Arab, Jewish, Chaldean, Greek and Latin writers by the glorious Doctor Prideaux
Russian
1792
Other
Prose
Yes
No
The true nature of imposture fully display'd in the life of Mahomet
The Trésor des simples is a work of religious polemics written between 1447 and 1451 by the bishop and author Jean Germain (1396?-1461) and dedicated to Germain’s patron Philip the Good.
The true nature of imposture fully display'd in the life of Mahomet
Discourse for the vindicating of Christianity from the charge of imposture
The true nature of imposture fully display'd in the life of Mahomet: with a discourse for the vindicating of Christianity from the charge of imposture : offer'd by way of letter, to the consideration of the deists of the present age
Al Koran of Mahomet.Translated from Arabic into English, with adding explanatory and historical notes to all unclear places in each chapter, selected by George Sale from the most reliable historians and Arab commentators of the Al-Koran; And with the addition of a detailed and thorough description of the life of the false prophet Mahomet, composed by the glorious doctor [Humphrey] Prideaux. From English to Russian translated by Aleksei Kolmakov
Russian
1792
Translation
Prose
Yes
No
The Koran, commonly called the Alcoran of Mohammed
The text is the 1792 translation of "The Koran, commonly called the Alcoran of Mohammed" (1734) by George Sale. The translator from English into Russian, Aleksei Kolmakov, produced a decent rendering but preserved Sale's mistakes. This text was published as a two-volume edition in 1792.
A translation from the Polish language of the printed book […] Mahomet's Alcoran, which was given as a present to the Great Sovereigns, Tsars, and Grand Dukes Ioann Alekseevich and Peter Alekseevich […]
The Koran of Mahomet, translated from Arabic into French by the translator of the French embassy in Persia, Kazimirski. With a commentary and Mahomet's biography. Translated from French by K. Nikolaev
Russian
1864
Prose
Yes
No
Le Koran. Traduction nouvelle faite sur le texte arabe par M. Kasimirski
In 1864, K. Nikolaev's translation of the Qur'an into Russian was published under the title 'Koran Magometa' (The Koran of Mahomet). This translation was based on the French text authored by Albert Kazimirski de Biberstein (1808-87). Nikolaev's translation significantly contributed to the spread of knowledge about Islam across wider layers of the Russian society. After the 1864 edition, the text was reprinted several times - in 1865, 1876, 1880, and 1901.
Sablukov's translation (1877, the year on the book cover 1878) is considered to be the first published rendering of the Qur'an into Russian made directly from the Arabic source text. This translation offered greater accuracy and fluidity than the earlier works.
Gordii Sablukov's work presents a comparative analysis of the Qur'anic and Biblical texts. The author discusses the names of God mentioned in the Qur'an and juxtaposes them to the names of God from the Old and New Testaments. Sablukov also provides information on how God's names are explained in Christian theology and used in worship.
The book of Al-Koran of the Arab [called] Mahomet, who, in the sixth century, passed it for as being sent down to him from heaven, and impersonated the last and greatest of the prophets of God. The translation from Arabic into French [was done] by André Du Ryer de La Garde-Malezair, one of the French king’s noblemen, who served his homeland honorably and for many years at Ottoman Porte, having earned the good trust of Murad the Third’s and sent with important errands for Louis the Thirteenth. Printed in Amsterdam and Leipzig in 1770; Translated into Russian in Moscow governorship, Klinskaia okruga, in the village of Mikhalev in 1790 [by M.I. Verevkin].
Russian
1790
Prose
Yes
No
L’Alcoran de Mahomet, translaté d’arabe en françois par le Sieur du Ryer, Sieur de la garde Malezair
Mikhail Verevkin's translation, like the earlier Qur'an translations into Russian, was based on André du Ryer's rendering. This meant that the 1790 translation also repeated the inaccuracies in conveying the meaning of the original text, introduced by the French translator. Verevkin's text became popular among its Russian readers and had a significant impact on shaping the image of Islam in Russian literature thanks to the author's clear and engaging writing style and creative use of
Church Slavonic words.
D.N.Boguslavskii's translation of the Qur'an is considered to be the first complete rendering into Russian from the original text. The manuscript of this translation was acquired by Iu. Krachkovskii in 1928 and analysed shortly afterwards; the first print edition was made in 1994.
At the request of Peter the Great, a revised version of De Curani etymologico nomine was translated into Russian by Ivan Il’inskii, Cantemir’s secretary and, despite opposition from the Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church, was published in 1722 as Kniga sistima ili sostoianie muhammedanskiia religii. This was to be a companion to the 1716 anonymous Russian translation of the Qur’an. Kniga sistima ili sostoianie muhammedanskiia religii has six parts: on the false Prophet Muḥammad; on the Qur’an; on the Muḥammadan Apocalypse; on Muḥammadan theology; on the Muḥammadan religion; and on other Muḥammadan teachings, which includes a description of the Sufi brotherhoods.
The Turkish Bible, or the very first German translation of the Koran to be made directly from the Arabic original: the necessity and utility of which are here demonstrated in a preliminary essay by Master David Friedrich Megerlin, Professor
German
1772
Translation
Prose
Yes
Polemical
Alastair Hamilton, ‘”To Rescue the Honour of the Germans”: Qur’an Translations by Eighteenth- and Early Nineteenth-Century German Protestants’, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 77 (2014), pp. 173-209 esp. pp. 182-7; Alastair Hamilton, ‘David Friedrich Megerlin’, in: David Thomas and John Chesworth (eds.), Christian-Muslim Relations. A Bibliographical History. Vol. 14. Central and Eastern Europe (1700-1800) (Leiden, 2020), pp. 187-91.
Though numerous German translations of the Qur’an had appeared in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Die türkische Bibel (1772) was the first German version to be made directly from the original. It is the work of the Lutheran theologian and pedagogue David Friedrich Megerlin (1698-1778). Despite its pioneering achievement, this is very much the work of a staunch Lutheran polemicist, eager for the conversion of Muslims and Jews. All in all it was not well received by contemporaries – most famously discarded by the young Goethe as a wretched work (elende Produktion), not least for its poor literary quality. Megerlin’s translation was also overshadowed by the German Qur'an translation published the following year by Friedrich Eberhard Boysen (1720-1800), which was received more favourably.
Literal interpretation of the Qur’an, with scholia according to the intention of the author, truthfully collected from its native expounders by Father Friar Dominicus Germanus de Silesia, from the city of Skorogoszcz in the bishopry of Wroclaw, who belongs to the Order of the Minor Friars of the reformed Roman province and is lector of S. Theology and teacher of oriental languages, as well as father of his province and the whole Order. Once he was Praefectus of the mission to Great Tartaria by the authority of the Apostolic See.
Arabic,Latin
1665
Translation
Preface; Introduction with list of exegetical sources. Qur'an translation with scholia
It is a Latin translation of the entire Qur'an. It includes commentary sections called "scholia" on each Surah, based on quotations from the most authoritative Islamic exegetes, both in Latin translation and in the original Arabic. The work was continuously revised until the end of the author.
Asterios Argyriou, “Un « Roman de Mahomet » grec inédit,” Graeco-Arabica 2 (1983): 139–190
This treatise is bound together with the "Exegesis to the Book of the Apocalypse by John the Theologian" by Andrew of Caesarea (563-637). Based extensively on Western sources, such as the journal of G. Brémond or the "Life of Muhammad" by J. Gagnier, the treatise of Jacob the monk is a refutation of Muhammad's night vision (Mi'raj), to which the author adds a discussion of the Prophet's wives and the holy places of Mecca and Medina.
Abbild- und Beschreibung deß Türckischen Haup-Fahnens
A Copy and Explication of the Turkish Military Standard seized by the Auxiliary Forces of the most glorious Swabian Imperial-Circle in the recently conquered fortification Neuhäusel (Nové Zámky). Together with an explication of the Arabic writing therein.
German
1686
Prose
Yes
Academic / Scientific
Following the conquest of the Ottoman fortress in Nóve Zámky (in modern Slovakia) in 1685 (two years into the Great Turkish War) by Imperial Forces, the Swabian forces seized an Ottoman standard there and brought it back with them. The Augsburg preacher and orientalist Matthias Friedrich Beck (1649-1701), relying on a copy of the standard, offers a short analysis of it and of the Arabic text sewn into it. The latter comprises mostly of the first three verses of Surat al-Fatḥ, which Beck produced in Hebrew transliteration, accompanied by a Latin phonetic transcript and German translation, with some added notes.
One of the most widely read and used of any medieval
anti-Jewish and anti-Islamic text, the Dialogi contra Iudaeos (and within them, the Titulus Quintus) represent a crucial turning-point in Christian portrayal of
Islam and Judaism in medieval Europe. For the first time, polemics grounded on the Talmud and the Qur’an, interpreted as two illicit pseudo-revelations
which formed the bases for two heretical doctrines. Both Talmud and
Qur’an, for Alfonsi, could be attacked through scriptural and rational scientific
argumentation.
The Miroir historial is the first French-language text to provide a history of the Qur'an (as a book), as well as descriptions (based on Qur'anic verses) of certain Muslim rites
One of the earliest and most influential comparative studies of religion in early modern Europe, Samuel Purchas' work is encyclopaedic in scope. It seeks to describe religion, "the soul of the world", as lived around the world. The work is an armchair travelogue for which Purchas claimed, in his dedication, to have consulted "about a thousand authors". The book is composed of nine geographical sections. Islam is presented in the third book ("Of the Arabians, Saracesn, Turks, and of the Ancient Inhabitants of Asia MInor and of their religions"). Chapter IIII, entitled "Of the Alcoran, or Alfurcan, containing the Mahumetan law: the summe and contents thereof", offers a 10-page summary of the contents of the Qur'an, based on Bibliander's edition, which Purchas evidently read attentively.
Machumetis Saracenorum principis, eiusque successorum vitae, ac doctrina, ipseque Alcoran
Latin
1542
Translation
Yes
No
Robert of Ketton's translation
Academic / Scientific
Hartmut Bobzin, Der Koran im Zeitalter der Reformation. Studien zur Frühgeschichte der Arabistik und Islamkunde in Europa, Berlin, 1995; Hartmut Bobzin, ‘Über Theodor Bibliander Arbeit am Koran (1542/43)’, Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft 186 (1986) 347-63; Thomas Burman, Reading the Qurʾan in Latin Christendom 1140–1560, Philadelphia PA, 2007; Johannes Ehmann, Luther, Türken und Islam. Eine Untersuchung zum Türken- und Islambild Martin Luthers, Gütersloh, 2008; Lucia Felici, ‘Una nuova immagine dell’Islam (e del Cristianesimo) nell’Europa del XVI secolo’, in G. Abbattista (ed.), Encountering otherness. Diversities and transcultural experiences in early modern European culture, Trieste, 2011, 43-66; Lucia Felici, ‘Universalism and tolerance in a follower of Erasmus from Zurich. Theodor Bibliander’, in K. Enenkel (ed.), The reception of Erasmus in the early modern period, Leiden, 2013, 85-102; Manfred Köhler, Melanchthon und der Islam, Ein Beitrag zur Klärung des Verhältnisses zwischen Christentum und Fremdreligionen in der Reformationszeit, Leipzig, 1938; Gregory J. Miller, ‘Theodor Bibliander’s Machumetis Saracenorum principis eiusque successorum vitae, doctrina ac ipse alcoran (1543) as the sixteenth century "Encyclopedia" of Islam’, ICMR 24 (2013) 241-54; Christian Moser, Theodor Bibliander (1505-1564). Annotierte Bibliographie der gedruckten Werke, Zurich, 2009; Rudolf Pfister, ‘Das Türkenbüchlein Theodor Biblianders’, Theologische Zeitschrift 9 (1953) 438-54; Victor Segesvary, L’Islam et la Réforme. Etude sur l’attitude des Réformateurs zuruchois envers l’islam, 1510-1550, San Francisco CA, 1998; Katya Vehlow, ‘The Swiss reformers Zwingli, Bullinger and Bibliander and their attitude to Islam (1520-1560)’, ICMR 6 (1995) 229-54; Cristine Christ-v. Wedel, Theodor Bibliander (1505-1564). Ein Thurgauer im Gelehrten Zürich der Reformationszeit. Verlag Neue Zürcher Zeitung, Zurich, 2005
About the Faith of the Orthodox and of the Saracens
Greek
1550
Other
Polemical and apocalyptical texts
Prose
Yes
No
The Greek translation of Contra legem Sarracenorum
Polemical
Polemics against Islam
Ioannis Karmiris (ed.), Ho Pachomios Rousanos kai ta anekdota dogmatika kai alla erga autou (Athens, 1935), pp. 242-265; Octavian-Adrian Negoiță, "Pachōmios Rousanos", in: D. Thomas & J. Chestworth (eds.), Christian-Muslim Relations Online II (Leiden / Boston: Brill, 2022)
This is Rousanos' only polemical treatise against Islam, in which he adopts a comparative perspective for refuting 'the religion of Muhammad'. Conventionally divided into two parts, the first apologetical and the second polemical, Rousanos' treatise discusses topics related to Orthodox dogma (Trinity, Christology, etc.) and Islamic beliefs. A considerable part in this treatise is occupied by the polemic Rousanos directs against the Qur'an, which he compares with the Christian Scriptures.
The text is a double translation (Arabic-Syriac-Italian) of some Qur'anic passages of Christological subject. It was possibly compiled within the activities of the Typographia Medicea, and in particular within the Congregazione (Commission) for the edition, translation and confutation of the Qur'an. Leonardo Abel was in fact named in that Commission. The aim of the translations seem to be a confirmation of the Christian truth through the Qur'anic text.
A selection of expressions from the Qur'an, in Garšūnī, listed in alphabetical order. The titles of the sections are in Arabic; they include Sūrat al-nisāʼ and Sūrat al-māʼida. The lexicon is related to a similar compilation by the same author (BAV Vat. Sir. 214) and the ms BAV Vat. Ar. 83 compiled with Leonardo Abel.
A short Persian Qurʼan commentary dedicated to ʻAlī-Šīr Navāʼī (hence the title). It is considered an abridgment (muḫtaṣar) or compendium (mulaḫḫaṣ) of the Ǧavāhir al-tafsīr li-tuḥfat al-Amīr (by the same author), as it is also annotated in ms BnF, Suppl. Pers. 54, p. i. It became very popular for its explanatory translation of Qurʼanic verses in simple and concise Persian, quoting from other works of tafsīr, and for its esoteric interpretation of the text, illustrated with citations from Persian mystical poets. The tafsīr avoids any controversy and digressions on theological disagreements related both to Ṣūfism and to the Sunnī/Šīʻī division.
One of the typical multi-lingual Lexica compiled by Giovanni Battista Raimondi to approach Oriental languages. He used a comparative method, in this case facilitated by the source, a Persian tafsīr of the Arabic Qurʼan, from which he extrapolated this lexicon.
This is a spiritual conversation between two scholars, the name of one of them is Shaykh Sinān and the name of the other is Aḥmad, which took place during their return from the Kaʻba; it is useful to every Muslim man and woman
The work is arguably attributed to the Jesuit Giovanni Battista Eliano, and most likely published in Rome at the Printing House of the Collegio Romano before 1580. It consists of three dialogues in incorrect Arabic between two Muslims returning from their pilgrimage to Mecca. These discuss a series of issues about the Qurʼan, with direct quotation of the text, discovering many contradictions in it; this leads them to conclude that Christians possess the true Revelation and the authentic Scriptures. The three dialogues are rhetorically set up to prove the truth of Christianity using the Qurʼan itself, even if they reveal a poor knowledge of Islamic theology. Given the numerous witnesses (printed and manuscript) and translations of the text, it is possible that this was part of the didactic equipment used in the Roman colleges during the XVI c. for the training of missionaries and the formation of Oriental Christians. The work is known in two different recensions, one of which includes an introduction (not in the printed edition) mentioning the year in which the conversation should have taken place (940 H/1534 AD) and the (pseudo-)author of the work, a certain Aḥmad al-Tanūsī, one of the two speakers (the other one is named Shaykh Sinān al-Miṣrī).
De Terra Sancta. Liber de modo, quomodo potest Terra sancta recuperari. Liber, qui est de acquisitione Terrae sanctae seu modus recuperandi Terram sanctam, et mori amore Christi in fide. Modus recuperandi Terram sanctam
Oriental Library, or, Universal Dictionary: containing generally all that concerns the knowledge of the Peoples of the East: their Histories and Traditions true or fabulous: their Religions, Sects and Politics: their Government, Laws, Customs, Manners, Wars, and the Revolutions of their Empires: their Sciences, and their Arts: Their Theology, Mythology, Magic, Physics, Morals, Medicine, Mathematics, Natural History, Chronology, Geography, Astronomical Observations, Grammar, and Rhetoric: the Lives and Remarkable Actions of all their Saints, Doctors, Philosophers, Historians, Poets, Captains, and of all those who have made themselves illustrious among them, by their Virtue, or by their Knowledge: Critical judgments, and Extracts of all their Works: of their Treatises, Translations, Commentaries, Abridgments, Collections of Fables, Sentences; of Maxims, Proverbs, Tales, Good Words, and of all their Books written in Arabic, Persian, or Turkish, on all sorts of Sciences, Arts, and Professions
The Bibliothèque Orientale (BO) is an encyclopedic work comprising more than 8000 entries covering a wide range of topics related to Islamic civilization based on Arabic, Persian and Turkish sources. Ḥajjī Khalīfa's bibliographical catalogue, Kashf al-Ẓunūn (1653) is a major source but not an exclusive one. A vast collection of primary sources, the BO became the main reference work on the Orient and Islam and it remained so until the professionalisation of Oriental studies in the 19th century. Long citations of the Qur'an can be found in the twin entries on "Alcoran" and "Mohammed", as well as those on Qur'anic prophets and religious themes such as "Hayat" (life), "Eschk" (love), "Gennah" (paradise), "Afu" (forgiveness). The latter entries often privilege a mystical reading of the Muslim scripture, although elsewhere d'Herbelot caracterises the Qurʾān conventionally as a “pack of crude falsehoods” (BO, p. 599) assembled by an "impostor".
The printing of the BO was completed after d'Herbelot's with the help of Antoine Galland, who also wrote a preface to the work.
Ἀπολογίαι τέσσαρες / Λόγοι τέσσαρες κατά Μωαμεθανῶν
Four Apologies / Four Orations against Muhammad
Greek
1373
Other
Prose
Yes
No
The Greek translation of Contra legem Sarracenorum
Polemical
Polemics against Islam
Klaus-Peter Todt, Johannes VI. Kantakuzenos und der Islam: Politische Realität und theologische Polemik im palaiologenzeitlichen Byzanz (Würzburg / Echter: Altenberge / Oros Verlag, 1991); Karl Förstel (ed. and trans.), Johannes Kantakuzenos: Christentum und Islam - Apologetische und polemische Schriften (Altenberge: Oros Verlag, 2005)
The apologies and orations against Muhammad by John Kantakouzenos were the most read and circulated Byzantine literary pieces of polemical literature not only in the Orthodox milieu but also in Western Christianity. They have been offered in vernacular Greek during the premodern period by the Cretan theologian Meletios Syrigos (1586-1664). There is also a middle Bulgarian Church Slavonic translation (completed during the 15th century) and also a Romanian translation (1669).
Book on the holy pilgrimages to Mount Zion to venerate the sepulchre of Christ in Jerusalem, and to Mount Sinai to the holy virgin and martyr Catherine
Part 2 (De moribus, ritibus et erroribus eorum qui sanctam inhabitant terram)
Latin
1486
Other
Prose
Yes
Polemical
Polemics against Islam
Bernhard von Breydenbach's Opusculum (first published in Latin in 1486) is a pilgrimage account relating to a travel made in 1483 to the Holy Land and Sinai, and containing a large section devoted to the life of Muhammad and the Qur’an based on late-medieval sources. It enjoyed an exceptional diffusion all over Europe between the late 15th-16th century, being translated into several vernacular languages (German, Dutch, French, Spanish, Czech, Polish) and establishing itself as a reference work on the geography of the Holy Land, its inhabitants and their religions.
The holy pilgrimages to Jerusalem and the surrounding area and the neighbouring places, to the Mount of Synay and the glorious Catherine
Part 2
Middle French
1488
Other
Prose
Yes
Polemical
Polemics against Islam
First French translation of Bernhard von Breydenbach's Opusculum sanctarum peregrinationum, made by Nicole le Huen and dedicated to the Queen Marguerite
Spanish translation of Bernhard von Breydenbach's Opusculum sanctarum peregrinationum, made by Martín Martínez Dampiés (including commentaries by the translator himself).
The Arabian pilgrimage to the tomb of Saint Catherine, Virgin and Martyr, whom the holy angels buried in Araby on Mount Sinai, by noble people of German origins in the year of our Lord 1483
Polish
1610
Other
Prose
Polish translation by Andrzej Wargocki of a section of Bernhard von Breydenbach's Opusculum sanctarum peregrinationum
Written in Brixen in September 1453. The same month, a manuscript copy was immediately sent to Juan de Segovia at the Aiton monastery. A literary dialogue between God's word, i.e. Christ, Paul, Peter, and fifteen representatives of the religions and cultures of the ecumene, held in heavenly Jerusalem at the presence of God the Father. Islam and Judaism are involved. Known to scholars for its much-debated and controversial motto, i.e. una religio in rituum varietate, it is relevant to the medieval discussion of the relation between faith and religious rites. Interpreted by early Reformists as a Protestant theological work ante litteram.
The Travels of Sir John Mandeville (Insular Version); The Book of John Mandeville; Mandeville's Travels
Chapter XV
Middle French
1351
Other
Prose
Yes
No
Pseudo William of Tripoli's De statu Sarracenorum
Apologetic
Apology of Christianity
The Book of Travels contains, in chapter 15, a long excursus on the law of the Saracens. It focuses on the similarities between Islam and Christianity, thus privileging the verses of the Qur'an that concern Muslim Christology and Mariology.
The Insular Version represents the first version of the text, from which the Continental and Liege versions are derived
Translation into Italian of the work arguably attributed to the Jesuit Giovanni Battista Eliano, and most likely published - in its Arabic version - in Rome, at the Printing House of the Collegio Romano before 1580.
Antonio da Crema's account of his 1486 pilgrimage to Jerusalem, containing a section about "Alchuni errori di Machometto cavati di l'Alchorano" mainly echoing Riccoldo da Monte di Croce's "Contra legem sarracenorum".
Della vita di Macometto, de suoi costume, della sua falsa et perfida dottrina”; “Di qual schiata et paese fu Maumetto, et in qual tempo cominciò la sua setta”; "“Il principio della signoria del Turco e i principi che vi sono stati”
The Italian translation of Pedro Mexía's spanish "Silva de varia lección", the "Selva di varia lezione" (1549) by Mambrino Roseo contains interesting chapters about Muhammad and Islam, with qur'anic references.
“De que linage y de que tierra fue Mahoma, y en que tiempo començò su malvada secta”; “En el qual en suma se pone el principio y origen del senorio del gran Turco, y quantos señores y principes ha avido en él”
Collection of prose on various subjects (history, customs, superstitions, mythology, etc.) written in 1540 by Pedro Mexía and repeatedly printed and translated (see Italian translation by Mabrino Roseo). It contains interesting chapters about Muhammad and Islam, with qur'anic references.
Alexander Ross’s "Pansebeia, or a View of the religions of the world" was first published in 1653. Ross's enterprise represented the first attempt to describe religious diversity from an exhaustive point of view. The book was a successful publication. By the end of the century, the text had appeared in eight editions and reprints (1655, 1658, 1673, 1675, 1683, 1696) and had been translated into Dutch (1662), French (1666) and German (1668).
The section of Islam (sixth section, "religions) is only 16-pages long. The "Alcoran" is briefly addresses at the beginning of this section. It described conventionally as "hodge-podge of fooleries and impieties.
To write his book and, in particular, the section on islam, Ross drew extensively on Samuel Purchas's book.
The translator to the Christian reader; The French Epistle to the Reader; A Summary of the Religion of the Turks; The Alcoran of Mahomet; The Life and Death of Mahomet; A needfull Caveat or Admonition for them who desire to know what use may be made of, or if there be danger in reading the Alcoran
"The Alcoran of Mahomet", printed in London in 1649, constituted the first rendition of the Qur'an into English. Published in the highly unstable period of the English Civil War, the translation was instantly controversial. The title page does not identify a printer or translator. The identity of the translator and author of some of the paratexts remains uncertain. Alexander Ross, who wrote the "Needfull Caveat" that follows the translation of the Qur'an, was early on taken to be the anonymous translator but this has recently been doubted on the basis that he does not seem to have known French well enough. The publication was a best-seller in seventeenth-century England and may have been printed partly for profit.
This is a thousand-pages long work detailing the languages known, or imagined, in Renaissance France.
The chapter on the Arabic language contains a thirteen-page long section entitled "De l’alphurcan ou alkoran de Mahomet". Using a relatively nonpolemical tone, the author compiled information on Muhammad, the Qur'an and the "Mahometans" drawn from a large array of sources available to him.
Baudier's "Histoire de la religion des Turcs" is a polemical but also an intellectually curious account of the religion of Islam, its history, theology, laws and customs. It contains a close reading of the Qur'an through Robert of Ketton's translation in Bibliander's edition (though the latter is rarely named). Book IV focuses on the Qur'anic retelling of the narratives from the Hebrew Bible. Book V examines the Qur'anic narratives of New Testament figures. A general presentation of the Qur'an is found in Chapter 1 of Book 2. Baudier used eye accounts of European captives to give a local flavour to his description of Islamic practices. His book was one of the most complete and systematic accounts of Islam in the early sixteenth century. With the emergence of a more robust and scholarly orientalism in the second half of the century, Baudier's account became outdated.
The fixed details, a compendium of al-Muqaddima al-Ǧazariyya on Qur'anic recitation
Arabic
1450
Other
Prose
No
Didactic / Educational
The text is a compendium of al-Jazarī's work al-Tamḥīd fī ʻilm al-taǧwīd, on Qur'anic recitation. This work has been a source for the compilation of the Alphabetum Arabicum, published in 1592 by Giovanni Battista Raimondi, scientific director of the Typographia Medicea (Rome 1584). In particular, he took from this work information on the phonetic value of Arabic consonants, which he included in his primer handbook for western scholars.
Based on the exegesis of John 1:1, it is Nicholas of Cusa's first sermon likely held in Trier on Christmas night of 1430. Given orally in Moselfränkisch, it was later revised and written down in Latin. Besides speculations on the Trinity, it mentions a number of God's names with the related features or attributes, including the Arabic-Islamic one, namely Allahu Akbar, and the Jewish one, namely the Tetragram.
Dedicated to Cardinal Giuliano Cesarini, it is Nicholas of Cusa's most revelant and disputed gnoseological work, inspired by the author's diplomatic journey to Byzantium (1437). It includes a little studied section on Islam (Book III, chapter VIII), part of a theological reflection on the Trinity and the role of Christ in human redemption.
Against Muhammad's perfidy and several sayings of the Saracens
Latin
1451
Other
Four books
Prose
Yes
No
Polemical
Polemics against Islam
A scholastic treatise in four books against Islam and the Qur'an written by Denis the Carthusian at Roermond at the request of Nicholas of Cusa (post 1451, ante 1461). Regarded by Cusa as less original and compelling than Juan de Segovia's treatise on Islam.
Epistula Saraceni [et] Rescriptum Christiani, Liber denudationis, oral debates with Muslims
Polemical
Polemics against Islam
Catalan treatise against Islam and the Qur'an ascribed to Pedro Pascual, member of the Order of Mercy and bishop of Jaén between 1296 and 1300, who was captured by the Nasrid Muslims and imprisoned in Granada. The ascription to Pedro Pascual was recently questioned. A manuscript copy of the treatise was sent from the Kingdom of Castile to Juan de Segovia in Aiton, who disregarded as uselessly polemical and unfaithful to Qur'anic contents.
Tractatus (Galensis) de Origine processu et fine Machometi et quadruplici reprobacione sue prophecie, Quadruplex Reprobatio, De Secta Machometi. De secta mahometana
On the Sect of Muhammad
Latin
1255
Other
Prose
Yes
No
Polemical
Polemics against Islam
It also contains a apology of Christianity that is similar to the Explanatio Simboli Apostolorum.
A sermon at the baptism of a Turk: following Isiah 54:2-3, 22 November 1746 at St Nicolai Church together with a baptismal address and a short account
German
1746
Prose
Yes
Polemical
Polemics against Islam
Renate Dürr, “Inventing a Lutheran Ritual: Baptism of Muslims and Africans in Early Modern Germany”, in Ulinka Rublack (ed.), Protestant Empires: Globalizing the Reformations (Cambridge, 2020), pp. 196-227, here 223f.
On 22 November 1746 a thirty-two-year-old Muslim named Wolko was baptized by the Lutheran pastor Christian Gotthold Wilisch (1696-1768) in the Saxon town of Freiberg. Wolko a "Turk", i.e. Sunnite Muslim was born is Sophia and had reportedly spent some years in Istanbul. He eventually ended up in Marseille and was then pressed by the Habsburgs. He was wounded in 1745 at the Battle of Kesselsdorff (between Prussia and the Habsburgs and their Saxon allies). He was treated in the Saxon town of Freiberg and baptized the following year taking the name Gottlieb Christian Friedrich Wohlfahrt.
The sermon delivered by Wilisch argues for the necessity of Christians studying the Qur’an to convince Muslims to convert by Christianity by engaging them in a well-informed dispute. The sermon includes detailed summaries of Qur’anic arguments from suras 2, 5, 9, 15, 37 as well as a quote in German od Q 5:6 on ablution, taken from David Nerreter’s 1703 translation of Marracci’s Latin Qur’an translation.
On Muhammad’s theft of teachings from Holy Scripture (in a single book), in which the Mohammedan religion is thoroughly vanquished
Latin
1711
Prose
Academic / Scientific
Polemics against Islam
This treatise follows an earlier work by Schwartz on literary plagiarism (De Plagio litarario, 1706), where Muhammad’s borrowings from Judaeo-Christian Scriptures are mentioned in passing as a case in point. The work itself is highly polemical. Muhammad is portrayed, as often before in Christian polemics, as an impostor. According to Schwatz, his access to the Bible enabled him to “steal” snippets of true wisdom and present them as a new revelation. Muhammad ,we are told, could get away with such plagiarism, due to what the author believes to have been the scarcity of any knowledge of Scripture in the Arabian Peninsula at the time. This polemical work also betrays a very close reading of the Qur’an (though not necessarily in the original as Schwartz claims). The argument of borrowing from Scripture would take on an intriguing new significance in Schwartz’s Specimen philosophiae orientalis antiquissimae ex Corano (1715).
In 1719, eight years after his treatise De Mohammedi furto sententiarum scripturae sacrae, Schwartz took his argument in an intriguing direction. A preoccupation of Schwartz’s in those years was the refutation of atheism. A central tool in his arsenal were philosophical proofs for the existence of God, ranging from Antiquity to Descartes and to his own day. Schwartz himself even offered his own “argument from design”, proving, to his mind, the existence of a benevolent deity from the structure of a single leaf. In the Qur’an he identified several such philosophical proofs, which Schwartz acknowledges as valid and genuine, in the sense that while they d not appear in the Bible, he takes them to be genuine Abrahamic arguments about God and the proof for his existence, which Muhammad had picked up. The Qur’an, several year earlier decried by Schwartz as the work of a literary plagiarist, becomes an intriguing storehouse of Abrahamic philosophy, proving the existence of God and offering a Lutheran theologian and pedagogue in the early eighteenth century, helpful arguments against contemporary European disbelief.
Copy of an Arabic letter sent by a Turk to Father Baldassare Loyola Mandes of the Society of Jesus in August 1664 and translated by the same Father into Italian, so that the great blindness of that unhappy soul might be seen.
Italian
1664
Other
Prose
Yes
Polemical
Polemics against Christianity
First folio (292r) of APUG, Ms. 1060-01, ff. 292r-294v containing the translated letter into Italian of Muḥammad Bulghayth al-Darawī to Baldassarre Loyola Mandes S.J.
The reply to the said letter, that is on the other side and translated into Italian by Father Baldassare Loyola Mandes of the Society of Jesus to whom it was sent by a Turk in the month of August 1664 and the said Father made this reply in Arabic and translated it into Italian in the college of Genoa to manifest to the Turk what the Christian Faith means and how bad his is be all for the honour and glory of God
Italian
Other
Prose
Yes
Polemical
Polemics against Islam
Second part (292v-294v) of APUG, Ms. 1060-01, ff. 292r-294v containing the reply of Baldassarre Loyola Mandes S.J. to Muḥammad Bulghayth al-Darawī
Specimen Suratarum, id est, Capitum aliquot ex Alcorani
Johann Zechendorff’s Sample of Suras, that is of several chapters from the system of the Qur’an together with [a sample] of his translation and refutation written several years ago, in God’s honour and for the propagation of His Word.
Romance
1638
Translation
following letter of dedication and suras 61 and 78 are prduced in Arabic and Latin, with a facing table, assessing the "truth value" of each Qur'anic statement.
Prose
Yes
Academic / Scientific
Asaph Ben-Tov, “Johann Zechendorff (1580-1662) and Arabic Studies at Zwickau’s Latin School”, in: Jan Loop, Alastair Hamilton, and Charles Burnett (eds.), The Teaching and Learning of Arabic in Early Modern Europe (Leiden, 2017), pp. 57-92., Ben-Tov, "Johann Zechendirff", in Christian Muslim Relations. vol. 9 Western and Southern Europa (1600-1700), ed. David Thomas and John Chesworth (Leiden, 2017), pp. 850-5.)
In 1638 Zechendorff published his Specimen suratarum, containing the Arabic text of two short suras 61 (The Battle Array) and 78 (The Tidings) accompanied by an interlinear Latin translation. The slim volume is dedicated to the Danzig scholar Johann Mochinger (1603-1652). In his letter of dedication to Mochinger Zechendorff claims that his was to produce an Arabic-Latin edition of the entire Qur’an accompanied by a refutation. As with the Fabulae Muhammedicae (1627), here too refutation stands ostensibly at the centre of the work, though what Zechendorff carries out diverges from this. Each page of the coarsely printed Arabic text and interlinear Latin translation is faced by a table divided into “false” and “true” assessing the truth value of each verse in these chapters. Zechendorff was assessing it according to the criteria of his own confession (Lutheranism) yet nonetheless, a considerable portion of what he read in those short suras he deemed sound.
The coarse Arabic types which Zechendorff uses here and in his other works, were carved for him by one of his pupils.
The Mohammedan Fables or the Trifles of the Qur’an, which are to be found related in its entire system (which consists of 144 chapters), and are read, accepted and believed by the Turks, Moors, Persians as well as by the Arabs and other oriental peoples yet are upbraided, hissed off and rejected by pious Christians, faithfully translated from an Arabic manuscript and set forth poetically and recited at a graduation ceremony in the presence of schoolteachers, gentlemen of the cloth, consuls, the entire senate and other most learned men, by Master Johann Zechendorff of Lößnitz, headmaster of the Zwickau school on 13 August 1627.
Latin
1627
Other
Verses
No
Poetic / Creative
Asaph Ben-Tov, “Johann Zechendorff (1580-1662) and Arabic Studies at Zwickau’s Latin School”, in: Jan Loop, Alastair Hamilton, and Charles Burnett (eds.), The Teaching and Learning of Arabic in Early Modern Europe (Leiden, 2017), pp. 57-92., Ben-Tov, "Johann Zechendirff", in Christian Muslim Relations. vol. 9 Western and Southern Europa (1600-1700), ed. David Thomas and John Chesworth (Leiden, 2017), pp. 850-5.)
This is Zechendorff’s first published work concerning the Qur’an. Presented at a graduation ceremony on 13 August 1627, the Fabulae Muhammedicae (Mohammedan Fables) is a playful retelling of ten episodes in the Qur'an which also appear, though in different fashion, in the Old Testament. The entire work is composed in Latin hexameter. It is ostensibly a damning "exposure" of discrepancies between the Qur'an and the Bible, yet both the playful tone and vivid retelling of the Qur'anic episodes betray an attentive reading of the Qur'an and more fascination that polemics.
The text of one and the other Surah and their explication, taken from a certain Arab commentary explaining the dogmas of the Qur’an, its most significant and lesser words, submitted to the learned public by Johann Zechendorff, headmaster of the Zwickau Latin for a to better refutation [of the Qur’an] and a more solid judgment of the translation and well as of the commentator of the Mohammedan religion
Latin
1647
Translation
Prose
Yes
Academic / Scientific
Asaph Ben-Tov, “Johann Zechendorff (1580-1662) and Arabic Studies at Zwickau’s Latin School”, in: Jan Loop, Alastair Hamilton, and Charles Burnett (eds.), The Teaching and Learning of Arabic in Early Modern Europe (Leiden, 2017), pp. 57-92., Ben-Tov, "Johann Zechendirff", in Christian Muslim Relations. vol. 9 Western and Southern Europa (1600-1700), ed. David Thomas and John Chesworth (Leiden, 2017), pp. 850-5.)
This is Zechendorff's second qur'anic "specimen". Like the earlier publication, it contains the Arabic text of two short surahs 101 (The Disaster) and 103 (The Declining Day). Unlike the earlier Specimen Suratarum, Zechendorff here si not concerned with the truth value of these surahs (from a Lutheran pint of view) but rather with the explication with the aid a Muslim commentary -- in this case the tafsir by Baydawi, a copy of which he had received as a gift from some former pupils and was studying intensively. In his later years Zechendorff sold his copy of Baydawi to the city of Zurich. Though the task of reading the Qur’an via Baydawi turned out to be too difficult for the Zwickau autodidact, it is nonetheless a pioneering feat. This is one of the first published attempts by a European scholar to understand the Qur’an with the aid of a Muslim commentary.
An Arabic paraphrase of the Seven Penitential Psalms.
An Arabic paraphrase of the seven penitential psalms, i.e. in the style of and taken from the system of the Quran, which contains CXIII chapters, or rather from the Arab Cicero and in the Ismaelitic and regal Solomonic language: in pure and unadulterated speech set down rhythmically, with an interlinear Latin translation for the benefit of German students of Arabic, to allow them an easier access to the Qur’an
Arabic
Verses
Asaph Ben-Tov, “Johann Zechendorff (1580-1662) and Arabic Studies at Zwickau’s Latin School”, in: Jan Loop, Alastair Hamilton, and Charles Burnett (eds.), The Teaching and Learning of Arabic in Early Modern Europe (Leiden, 2017), pp. 57-92., Ben-Tov, "Johann Zechendirff", in Christian Muslim Relations. vol. 9 Western and Southern Europa (1600-1700), ed. David Thomas and John Chesworth (Leiden, 2017), pp. 850-5.)
Sometime in the 1630s (the exact year is not specified), Johann Zechendorff composed a "Qur'anic paraphrase" of the seven Penitential Psalms. For each verse of these psalms, he offers a series of Arabic verses imitating the style of the Qur'an which approximate the tenor of the given verse. Ostensibly meant as an exercise in Arabic for his pupils and private, visiting students in Zwickau, this original -- and unusual -- work is predicated on an affinity Zechendirff sensed between the poetic language of the Qur'an and the Psalter. It was composed during a virulent bubonic outbreak in Zwickau during the Thirty Years War. It is at once a clever exercise in Arabic, acquainting his pupils (as Zechendorff argues in the lengthy German introduction to the work) with the language and style if the Qur'an and, at the same time, is a work of Lutheran piety in the face of the hellish misery unleashed by the Thirty Years War. The work is extant in a single manuscript in Zechendorff's hand at Zwickau's Rattschulbibliothek.
As the title suggest, this (unusually long) academic dissertation by David Mill, "excavates" beliefs and practices which the author identifies as Muslim in pre-Muslim times. This serves the polemical argument, that Muhammad had "merely stolen" his religion form earlier sources -- a common Christian polemical argument -- at the same time it offers a learned, and by the standards of the day a very thorough study of the religious world of Late Antiquity (a modern term Millius was not acquainted with) in which Islam emerged. This dissertation has been preserved in a collection of David Mill's dissertation published in 1743, without indication of the original year of composition and publication.
An Inaugural Dissertation on the First Surah of the Qur'an
Latin
1743
Other
Sermo Arabicus surae primae Alcorani ex editione Hinckelmanni. Obseruatio de uoce אלקראן. Varia lectio nominis שורה. Quem uirum doctum Acoluthus scholio suo reprehenderit? Varia lectio uocis פאתחה. Varietas lectionis uocabuli אלכתאב. Lectio uaria uocis שבעה. Varietas lectionis uocis איאת. De lectione uocis מדינה. Argumentum surae I ex uariis libris proponitur, et quaedam de titulis surarum traduntur. De lectione et scriptura uoce בשם. De scriptura uocis אללה. De nominis אלרחמן scriptura. De lectione uaria uocis עיר. Vatietas lectionis et scripturae uocabuli אמין. Explicatio uocis אלקראן. De nominibus quibusdam Alcorani. Exponitur nomen שורה. De uoce פאתחה et nominibus synonymis primae surae. Illustratur uox איאת. Exlicatio uocabuli מדינה. Positio urbium Medinae et Meccae. Explicatur formula בשם אללא. Nota de uocabulo אללא. De phrasi אלרחמן אלרחים. Obseruatio de uoce רב. Explicatio nominis עאלמין. Quid sid יום אלדין? Quid significet אלמשתקים? Enodatur phrasis גיר מגצוב. De uocabulis מגצוב et אלצאלין. Variae Latinae uersiones surae primae. Pleraeque Alcorani surae non simul totae a Mohammede sunt editae, quibus tamen prima non uidetur esse accensenda. De numero septenario uersuum, ac mysteriis, surae primae, itemque de uocalibus, et numeris uersiculorum, Alcorani. De formula bismillahi. De stilo et arg. surae primae. De frequenti recitatione huius surae apud Mohammedanos, et huius recitationis utilitate.
Prose
Yes
Academic / Scientific
The dissertation was presented on 8 May 1743 at the philosophical faculty of the University of Altorf by a certain Jakob Christoph Wilhelm Holste to obtain the degree of magister artium. He seems to have later pursued an ecclesiastical career in the Lutheran Church. Holste may have had a hand in composing the work. This is a detailed treatment of the first Surah. Mostly unoriginal, it offers an extensive summary of the existing European scholarship on this Surah. The Arabic text follows Abraham Hinckelmann's Qur'an edition (1694), which is produced in Hebrew transliteration.
An Assertion of the Lord's Passion against the Jews & Turks in Dialogue.
Latin
1642
Other
Prose
Yes
Polemical
Apology of Christianity
Hackspan's dialogue brings together a Lutheran (representing the author's point of view), a Catholic, a Jew, and a Muslim. The first half of the work pivots on Muslim negation of Christ's passion and the other interlocutors' response to this. The Muslim interlocutor ("Turk") quote at length from the Qur'an both in Arabic -- followed by a Latin translation. While the work concludes, as expected, with the validation of the Christian view of the Passion both the Muslim and Jewish interlocutors are allowed to lay out their views (as Hackspan understood them).
The Faith (or: Religion) and Laws of Muhammad shown from two Qur'an manuscripts, preceded by an Arabic Grammar.
1646
Other
Institutiones (Grammar) sig. A1r-H3r / Fides et Leges Muhammedis sig. H3v-N4v.
Prose
Yes
Academic / Scientific
The work is comprised of two parts of roughly equal length: an introduction to Arabic and the eponymous Fides et leges Mohammedi (The Faith and Laws of Muhammad). The latter comprises of six doctrinal statements (positiones), expounding a Muslim theological point and thirteen Muslim laws (leges). These are an attempt to summarise the entire teaching of Islam (as Hackspan understood it), based solely on his thorough reading of the Qur'an, from which he quotes at length. The work ends with a single page appendix with Arabic astronomical terms.
An historical-philological-theological dissertation on the first Arabic edition of the Qur’an among Europeans, made by Paganino Paganini (Paganinus Bruxensis) in Italy more than a century and a half ago but obliterated completely by command of the Roman Pontiff.
Latin
1703
Other
Prose
No
Academic / Scientific
Ben-Tov, Glei to be added (Zotero).
This is the first of three disputations by Lange concerned with the Historia Literaria of the Qur'an in Europe, chronicling the history of Qur'an scholarship -- mostly among European Christians. It is imbedded in Lange's confessional outlooks, since this dissertation retells the story of the forgotten Qur'an edition prepared in Venice in the 1530s and which Lange and his contemporaries knew about only from hearsay. He gladly retells the story of the papal decree ordering the burning of all editions of the Qur'an. Modern scholarship has convincingly shown this to have been a false accusation, yet for Lange, the Protestant orientalist, writing shortly after Ludovico Marracci's epochal Qur'an (1698), it was a welcome opportunity to portray the Catholic Church as inimical to the serious study of the Qur'an -- at least in the 1530s.
De Speciminibus, Conatibus variis atque novissimis Successibus Doctorum quorundam virorum in edendo Alcorano Arabico
An historical-philological-theological dissertation on Specimens, various attempts and successes of certain learned men in editing the Qur’an in Arabic
Latin
1704
Prose
Academic / Scientific
Ben-Tov, Glei Zotero-ref. to be added
The second in a series of three dissertations on the history of Qur'an scholarship by the Altdorf theologian Johann Michael Lange, it surveys the history of printed edition of the entire Qur'an and portions thereof in Europe.
An historical-philological-theological dissertation on various oriental and occidental translations of the Qur’an, both printed and heretofore unpublished
Latin
1704
Prose
Academic / Scientific
Ben-Tov, Glei (Zotero)
The third and final dissertation on the history of Qur'an scholarship by the Altdorf theologian Johann Michael Lange, it examines the history of both oriental and European translations of thr Qur'an -- or portions thereof. The focus is on the European translations.
De Fabulis Mohhamaedicis circa SS. Trinitatis Mysterium.
In honour of Johann Christoph Wagenseil, Altdorf Professor of Canon Law and Polymath, a theological dissertation by Master Johann Michael Lange, theological licentiate and pastor in Vohenstrauß in Palatinate Sulzbach On the Mohammedan Fables concerning the Mystery of the Most Holy Trinity and Divine Generation. In which is shown that Muhammad the False Prophet falsely attributes to Christians: I. Polytheism, especial Tritheism. II. That according to Christian teaching, Mary the Mother of Christ was is the third Person of the Trinity. III. A profane dogma on divine generation and finally IV. It is demonstrated from Christian Antiquity and from the history of the Qur’an that that Muhammad reached his false arguments not through theCollyridian heresy, as Marracci would have it, but rather from his misunderstanding of disputes against an Arian and especial against a Nestorian [...].
Latin
1697
Other
I. De polytheismo, quem Mohhamed in Alcorano suo Christianis & Judaeis in genere; in specie vero de Tritheismo, quem Christianis idem Impostor impudentissime adfingit. (pp. 12-36) II. De Trinitate monstrosa, PATRE, MATRE & FILIO, quam Mohhamaed Christianis tribuere non erubescit. (pp. 36-56) III. De Figmento Alcorani, quod, ex Christianorum doctrina, in divinis Generatio conjugalis detur. (pp. 56-9) IV. De perpetua Ecclesiae Christi doctrina & fontibus fabularum Mohhammaedicarum, quas hactenus exposuimus. (pp. 60-81) Parergon (pp. 81-102) Parergon II (pp. 103-17).
Prose
Yes
Academic / Scientific
Apology of Christianity
Martin Mulsow,“Socinianism, Islam and the radical uses of Arabic scholarship”, Al-Qantara 31 (2) (2010), 549-86, here 581f.
One of the few works left by the short-lived scholar Matthias Georg Schröder (1695-1719). Its aim is to collect and discuss verses in the Qur'an which to the author's mind prove the veracity of Christian doctrine. Muhammad is for Schröder thus an unwilling witness to the Christian truth.
The entire Qur'an of Muhammad son of Abdallah the text of which has been edited from excellent manuscripts in addition to printed editions and supplied with an accurate Latin version and short, excellent notes by Johann Gottfried Lakemacher. To this is added an Arabic lexicon of all the words used in the Qur’an.
The entire Qur'an of Muhammad son of Abdallah
Latin and Arabic
Latin
Qur'an
Yes
Academic / Scientific
Schnurrer, Bibliotheca arabica, pp. 415f.
Despite its title, this publication is a short specimen, meant as a sample of a translation of the entire Qur'an. It encompasses the first 14 verses of Surah 2.
The rudiments of Arabic, in which all the paradigms, necessary for a solid command of this language are shown. To these are added several Arabic texts and a sample of a correct analysis.
Latin
Yes
Academic / Scientific
To this short grammar by Johann Gottfried Lakemacher were appended several Arabic texts. These include the Arabic text of surah 15 in Arabic accompanied by an interlinear Latin translation on pp. 77-86.
Mohammedis Filii Abdallae Pseudo-Prophetae Fides Islamitica, i.e. Al-Coranus
The Islamic Faith of the False Prophet Muhammad Son of Abdallah, i.e. The Qur’an first composed in Arabic by Muhammad, translated into Latin by Ludovico Marracci of the of the Congregation of the Clerics Regular of the Mother of God and Confessor to Pope Innocent XI, and explicated with his notes and those of others, and prefaced by an introduction and a general view of the entire Mohammedan Religion from the Qur’an. Thge Suras and their verses are notes throughout
Latin
1721
Translation
Prose
No
Academic / Scientific
In 1721 the Leipzig Hebraist Christian Reineccius published the Latin text of Ludovico Marracci's Qur'an -- omitting the Arabic text and Marraccis enormous apparatus of tafsir and his own commentary. The result was an affordable Latin Qur'an in octavo format prefaced by Reineccius' extensive introduction. The volume is dedicated to Duke Christian of Saxe-Weissenfels (1682-1736). Shortly after the publication of this Qur’an, Reineccius would become headmaster of the Weissenfels academic gymnasium.
Der Koran, Oder insgemein so genannte Alcoran des Mohammeds.
The Qur’an , commonly called Muhammad’s Alcoran, translated directly from the Arabic Original into English by George Sale, Gentleman, with added elucidating comments from the most trusted commentators as well as a Preliminary Discourse. Translated most accurately into German by Theodor Arnold.
German
1746
Prose
Theodor Arnold's 1746 German Qur'an joins a series of German translations of the Qur'an made from other European translations -- the first being Salomon Schweigger's translation from Italian (1616). In addition to a German rendering of Sale English translation, he also translated the latter's Preliminary Discourse, making Sale approach to the Qur'an and Islam available to a broad German readership.
Antoine Galland produced a complete and original translation of the Qur'an in the years 1709-1712. Encouraged by his patron, abbé Jean-Paul Bignon (1662-1743), Galland made the translation on the basis of various Qur'anic manuscripts, some of which contained Persian and Turkish Ottoman interlinear translations of the Qur'an. He considered to have therefore been able to better grasp the Muslim understanding of the text and to have "corrected" Marracci's translation on a number of points. Galland's translation contained historical and grammatical notes and various accompanying texts, including a biography of the Prophet. The unpublished two-volume manuscript was bequeathed to Bignon. Its trace was lost after 1728 (see F. Bauden).
Remarques sur le chapitre VII; Remarques sur le chapitre XI
French
1675
Other
Preface; Voyage au Mont Liban traduit de l'Italien ; Remarques
Prose
No
Academic / Scientific
This work contains a French translation by Richard Simon of the Jesuit Giralomo Dandini's (d. 1634) account of the Levant. It is followed by Simon's corrections and reflections which serve to redress widespread misconceptions of Muslims and Islam. In his remarks to chapters VII and XI, Richard Simon describes the Muslim prayers, providing a transcription of Arabic formulas used. Elements of theology are given, as well as a respectful account of the status of the "Alcoran" and a brief mention of the status of Jesus in it.
Histoire critique de la creance et des coûtumes des nations du Levant
Critical history of the creed and customs of the nations of the Levant
Chap. XV De la creance et des coûtumes. des Mahometans
French
1684
Other
Prose
Academic / Scientific
This work contains a twenty-page account of the Muslim religion. The chapter touched on prayer, ablutions, beliefs (afterworld, predestination etc.) and the historical development of sects. There are a few short references to the nature of the Qur'an as revelation and as material text but no direct citations of Qur'anic verses.
Richard Simon does not specify his sources apart from the mention to a "Mahometan theological treaty written by one of their doctors" (p. 180).
Histoire critique de la creance et des coûtumes des nations du Levant
Critical history of the creed and customs of the nations of the Levant
Chap. XV De la creance et des coûtumes. des Mahometans
French
1684
Other
Prose
Academic / Scientific
This work contains a twenty-page account of the Muslim religion. The chapter touched on prayer, ablutions, beliefs (afterworld, predestination etc.) and the historical development of sects. There are a few short references to the nature of the Qur'an as revelation and as material text but no direct citations of Qur'anic verses.
Richard Simon does not specify his sources apart from the mention to a "Mahometan theological treaty written by one of their doctors" (p. 180).
Richard Simon's Nouvelle Bibliothèque is a collection of detailed reviews of recently published books. Chapter XII is devoted to Marracci's Alcorani textus universus. Simon provides some of the context in which Marraci's work was published and describes its structure and contents.
Three samples of Arabic letters by Petrus Kirstenius of Breslau, doctor of philosophy and medicine. Or: The Prayer of our Lord Jesus Christ, a more ardent prayer than which has never been heard either on earth or in heaven, which John reports in chapter 17, transcribed from an ancient Arabic manuscript in the Imperial collection. And King David’s Psalm number fifty, or fifty-one according to the Hebrews. And further, the first Surah of the book commonly known as Alkoran, which many call the Mohammedan confession of faith, edited from a collation of six manuscript exemplars.
Arabic
1608
Other
Yes
The text of Surat al-Fātiḥah is produced in elegant Arabic types on pp. 9-10, alongside Kirstenius’ Latin translation, followed by the Latin translations by Robert of Ketton, an unnamed translator and Guillaume Postel.
Alcoranus Mahometicus. Oder: Türckenglaub / auß deß Mahomets eygenem Buch / genannt Alcoran vnnd seinen 124. darinn begriffenen Azoaris, in ein kurtz Compendium zusammen gebracht
The Mohamedan Alcoran: or: the Turkish Faith, from Muhammad’s own book, called Alcoran and its 124 Azoaras contained therein, summarized briefly in a short compendium. In it one may see what unfounded, abhorrent errors, and such which are contradictory to the entire holy, Prophetic and Apostolic Scripture and also and lead to eternal damnation Muhammad and his Turkish accolades accept and believe in and defend with sword and fire to the ruination of all Christendom and now especially to the detriment of the [Holy] Roman Empire up to the Danube.
German
1604
Other
p. 4f. Leuchter inveighs against unwilling to bear the financial burden (in taxation) of the Turkish wars. p. 5) The greatest advantage of the Holy Roman Empire over the Turks is the pure Gospel. p. 6) characteristics of the Turks 1) rapacity and cruelty to non-Muslims 2) polygamy 3) innate murderous nature – the charitable donation are a kind of Indulgence (vnd haben indulgentz mit geringen Allmussen). 4) Devşirme 5) are sworn enemies of Christians and are not bound by any oath. 6) [pp. 6f.] They despise the Gospel and persecute its followers. 7) [p. 7] They disseminate Muhammad’s teaching with violence. 8) [pp. 7f.] Islam rejects Scripture and Christ. p. 9) So habe ich offt [p. 10] gedachten Türckischen Alcoran (ist solcher Leut Bibel) gemacht / vnd ihn wiewol eylendt zu der selbigen besserer Information in diß kleine Compendium vnter die hierin verzeichnete achtzehen Capittel gebracht. Kurtzer Vorbericht von Mahomets Person / Leben und Todt. (p. 13) Testimonia Sacrae Scripturae (Dan. 7 & Rev. 9) (p. 19) Kurtze Antwort auff Mahomets Alcoran. (p. 20) 1. Von Mahomets Person vnd Vocation. (p. 21) 2. Mahomets Alcoran ist von Gott / wie der Juden Thalmuth / vnd der Bapisten zu Trident im Concilio geschlossene Decreta vnnd Canones. (24) 3. Von Gott (38) 4. Von Christo (45) 5. Vom Heiligen Geist. (55) 6. De creatione, von der Schöpfung. (57) 7. Von Erhaltung vnd Regierung aller Erschaffenen Dinge. (63) 8. De Peccatop. Von der Sünde. (69) 9. Vom Gesetze. 10. Vom Euangelio. (92) 11. De Iustificatione, von der Rechtfertigung deß Sündhafftigen Menschens vor Gott. (99) 12. De Oratione. Vom Gebett. (107) 13. De Sacramentis. Von Sacramenten. (111) 14. De morte & statu mortuorum. (115) 15. De Extremo die & Resurrectione mortuorum. Vom Jüngsten und letzten Tag vnd von Aufferstehung der Todten. (117) 16. De Extremo Iudicio. Von Jüngsten Gerichte. (121) 17. De Paradiso & vita aeterna. (129) 18. De Inferno & poenis damnatorum. Von der Hell / vnd der Pein der Verdampten. (139) p. 143) FINIS Contra de quodam ex Inferno saluando fabulam recitat in Colloquio cum iudaeis. Deus in fonte aerio & fiet albus totus.
Yes
Heinrich Leuchter's extensive (and polemical) attempt at a systematic sumary of Muslim dogma (informed by his Lutheran views) relies heavily on the 1543 Basel edition of Robert of Ketton's Latin rendering of the Qur'an.
The History of the Patriarch Joseph [taken] in Arabic from the Qur'an with three Latin translations and annotations by Thomas Erpenius to which is also added his Arabic alphabet
Latin
1617
Translation
Yes
Erpenius produces here the Arabic text of Sura Yusuf accompanied by a word for word interlinear translation and a less literal translation of each verse printed in the margins. Appended is his detailed commentary and Robert of Ketton's renderng of this sura. The text is clearly meant for students studying Arabic. Erpenius' comments aregrammatical rather than theological in nature. In addition to use in the calssroom in Leiden, it was probably meant to be an accompanying primer to his Arabic grammar.
This article, meant for a broad readership, was published by the Halle orientalist Christian Benedict Michaelis in the periodical Wöchentliche Hallische Anzeigen 31 (3 August 1750), pp. 509-16. The argument is traditional: listing discrepancies between historical accounts in the Old and New Testaments and the Qur'anic account of them. It evinces a thorough acquaintance with the Qur'an and includes several words in Arabic.
As with the article of 3 August 1750, this too was published by the Halle orientalist Christian Benedict Michaelis for a broad readership in the periodical Wöchentliche Hallische Anzeigen 5 (1 February 1751), pp. 66-75. Here too the argument is traditionally polemical.
Ritualia quaedem Codicis Sacris ex Alcorano illustrans
A philological dissertation illustrating several rituals in Holy Scripture from the Qur'an
Latin
1739
Other
Prose
Yes
This dissertation was written by the Halle professor Christian Benedict Michaelis and presented by his student Friedrich Eberhard Boysen (1720-1800), who in 1775 would publish his own German translation of the Qur'an. It uses the Qur'an as a source of antiquarian information to explicate various culturally obscure passages in the Hebrew Bible.
Naturalia quaedam et artificialia Codicis Sacri ex Alcorano
An inaugural philological dissertation explicating several natural and man-made phenomena in Holy Scripture from the Qur’an.
Latin
1739
Other
Yes
Presented in Halle on 30 September 1739 (several weeks after a similar Halle diss. on Old Testament rituals) as an inaugural dissertation, it was written by the Halle professor Christian Benedict Michaelis and defended by Christian Friedrich Tieffensee, who with this antiquarian dissertation, exploring the uses of the Qur'an for explicating antiquarian points of Scripture gained the degree of magister artium.
A new translation of a portion of Sura ii with added annotations: a sample of a new translation of the entire Qur'an
Latin
1754
A Latin translation of Q 2:1-109 with a commentary.
The work was presented by a Swedish student in Göttingen, Olaus (Olaf?) Domey (1726-1796). The title suggests this was a sample of an ongoing plan to publish a new Latin translation of the entire Qur'an -- here and elsewhere Michaelis had harsh criticism for Ludovico Marracci's Qur'an translation (1698). If either Michaelis or Domey completed such a translation, I have not found evidence of it.
NB The work was prefaced by a short introduction missing in many copies.
Johann David Michaelis' extensive review-essay of Friedrich Eberhard Boysen's German Qur'an translation (1775).
It was published in Michaelis' own Orientalische und Exegetische Bibliothek 8 (1775), pp. 30-98.
In addition to a consideration of Boysen's Qur'an translation, this review essay also offers Michaelis' views on the Qur'an and its European translations more broadly.
The Livre de l’eschiele Mahomet (Book of Muḥammad’s ladder) is a thirteenth-century Old French translation of a text that has its roots in the Muslim tradition of the isrāʾ and the miʿrāj, which narrates Muḥammad’s night journey and ascension to Heaven.
The Livre contains around fifteen quotations from the Qur'an, some of which are transliterations from Arabic; these transliterations are generally accompanied by a paraphrase or a literal translation into Old French. The rest of the quotations are directly translated.
This text contains the first known occurrence of the term alcoran in French.
The Spiegel historiael is a Middle Dutch adaptation (in verses) of Vincent de Beauvais's Speculum historiale.
In the fourth book, he includes and adapts the section on Islam and some qur'anic verses (thus adapted into Dutch verse). This is one of the earliest traces of qur'anic material in an early state of Dutch.
Leenert Jan Joosse, in Christian-Muslim Relations vol.8 (Leiden: Brill, 2016), s.v. (with bibliography)
This disputation was written by Gisbert(us) Voetius in 1648 and included in the 1655 second volume of his collected academic writings. The respondens at the 1648 disputation in Utrecht was Joann de Jonge.
See, "De Muhammedismo" in Gisbert Voetius, Selectarum Disputationum Theologicarum ars Secunda (Utrecht, 1655),pp. 659-83.
This disputation offers a summary of Gisbert's understanding of Islam -- whic, not surprisingly, he flatly rejects, yet considers closer to Christianity than Judaism and ancient paganism, and considers practical questions concerning mission. It evinces knowledge of the Qur'an as well as the author's direct comments on it and its European renderings.
Óscar de la Cruz Palma, La traducción latina del Corán atribuida al patriarca de constantinopla cirilo lúcaris (1572-1638) (Madrid, 2006). Roberto Tottoli, “La traduzione latina del Corano attribuita a Cirillo Lucaris (m. 1638) nel Ms Berlin, SBPK ar. 1032 e in altri manoscritti”, Quaderni di Studi Arabi (2016) (Studi in onore di Francesca Lucchetta), pp. 135-48.
The so-called Lucaris Qur'an is a partial Latin Qur'an translation which circulated in the seventeenth century in several manuscripts. It first appeared in print in a modern edition by Óscar de la Cruz Palma (2006).
Asaph Ben-Tov, "Historia Literaria Alcorani: Two Lutheran Scholars Chronicling Oriental Scholarship at the Turn of the Eighteenth Century", in: Loop and Kraye (eds.), Scholarship between Europe and the Levant: Essays in Honour of Alastair Hamilton (Leiden, 2020), pp. 195-216.
The 1701 treatise by the Rostock theologian Zacharias Grapius (Grape) (1671-1713) offer a short account of the "nature" of the Qur'an, following Aristotelian categories and a brief history of European study of it.
De Arabische Alkoran door de Zarazijnsche en de Turcksche Prophete Mahomet
The Arabic Alkoran by the Saracen and Turkish Prophet Muhammad
Dutch
1641
Translation
Prose
The 1641 Dutch translation of the Qur'an. The anonymous translator rendered the Dutch version from Salomon Schweigger's 1616 German Qur'an (itself a translation of the 1547 Italian, which is itself a translation from the 1543 Latin Basel Qur'an).
The bereft (childless) god of the Saracens taken from the Alcoran of Muhammad the False Prophet and assailed with his own weapons
Latin
1622
Other
Praefatio I. Muhamedani fatentur Deum, Potentem, Sapientem, Unum. II. Diffitentur Trinitatem Personarum. III. Imprimis Filium Dei abnegant IV. Iesum quidem pro sancto, verace, magnoque Prophetâ agnoscunt. V. Sed tamen pro mero Homine habent. VII. Primo, quod sit sine Patre conceptus. VIII. Secundo, quod sit incarnatus Dei Spiritus. IX. Tertio, quod locutus fuerit ab utero matris. X. Quatro quod animârit argillaceas aviculas. Corrolaria
Prose
Yes
This 1622 treatise, presented in Tübingen as a dissertation by a theology student by the name of Johann Falco is Schickard's attempt to characterise the Qur'anic concept of God. It is a seventeenth-century work of confessional scholarship and full of the expected polemics against Islam, yet betrays a serious study of the Qur'an, which is quoted in Arabic and a serious attempt to understand Muslim concepts of God -- however polemical.
The treatise by the Helmstedt scholar Hermann von der Hardt was part of his elaborate argument, trying to prove that a Greek dialect was the ultimate source for all oriental languages. This highly idiosyncratic works end with a (separately paginates) appendix including surahs 1, 64 and 12 (NB 64 and 12 had been published witha Latin translation by Thomas Erpenius).
In 1734 the young aristocrat Franz Ludwig von Oettingen (1709-1780) was studying in Helmstedt and reading Surah 15 with brilliant (and eccentric) professor Herman von der Hardt. On this festive occasion von der Hardt published the Arabic text of the Surah accompanied by a Greek and Latin translation with an Arabic-Greek lexicon appended. The point of this strange exercise was to demonstrate, what von de Hardt was convinced were the Greek origins of Arabic (as of any other oriental language, including Biblical Hebrew).
Thirty-one sermons on the Turk, concerning chapter 38 and 39 in the Book of Ezekiel on Gog and Magog in which the Turk’s origin, his religion and Alcoran with a simple refutation thereof
German
1595-6
Prose
Damaris Grimmsmann, Krieg mit Wort. Türkenpredigten des 16. Jahrhunderts im Alten Reich (Berlin, 2016), pp. 166-9.
A series of 31 sermons by the Lutheran pastor Johannes Lauch(ius) (1560-1599). Lauch's information on Islam and the Qur'an is derived to great extent from the Basel Qur'an (1543) to which he refers repeatedly. This collection is a primary example for the impact the Basel Qur'an had on the kind of information and arguments about Islam a broader public were exposed to.
Hartmut Bobzin, “Friedrich Rückert und der Koran”, in: idem (ed.), Der Koran in der Übersetzung von Friedrich Rückert ([1995] 5 edn. Würzburg, 2018), pp. ix-xxxviii.
In the 1830s Friedrich Rückert rendered large portions of the Qur'an into German verse. The work, though incomplete, is a masterpiece of German poetry and Qur'anic scholarship. It was first published in 1888, 22 years after Rückert's death.
A modern edition edited and prefaced by Hartmut Bobzin first appeared in 1995: Der Koran in der Übersetzung von Friedrich Rückert. See revised 5th edn. (2018).
A series of ten sermons on the the Ottomans and their religion by the Lutheran theologian Georg Mylius. The sermons abound in references to the 1543 Basel Qur'an (referencing Azoras) and testify to the broad impact of this printed Latin Qur'an.
This extremely brief Specimen, consists of the Arabic text of Q 27:19 (Solomon’s prayer) followed by Latin version taken from Zechendorff’s unpublished Qur’an translation.
This work, by the Pomeranian provost Andreas Prölaeus is an attack on Socinianism. Prölaues had published a massive work on Socinianism the previous year. In this shorter work he elaborates on what he considered to be the many points of agreement between Islam (i.e. the Qur'an which he was reading in Latin in the 1543 Basel edition) and Socinianism. The anti-Socinian arguments betray a close reading of the Basel Qur'an.
A consideration of the law and sect of the Saracens
Latin
1619
Prose
Besold offers here a succinct "summary" of Muslim teaching (against most of which he polemicizes -- though with some interesting nuances). His knowledge of Islam is gleaned from several sources -- among them his careful reading of the Basel Qur'an (1543).
Alastair Hamilton, "Friedrich Eberhard Boysen", in: David Thomas and John Chesworth (eds.), Christian-Muslim Relation. A Bibliographical History. Vol. 14. Central and Eastern Europe (1700-1800) (Leiden, 2020), pp. 210-15.
Boysen's was the second German translation to be made directly from thr Arabic -- appearing a year after David Friedrich Megerlin's German Qur'an. Boysen's rendering was much better received.
Mohammed Abdalia fia hamis prófétának islami hit-vallása, vagy-is az Al-korán
The Islamic Faith of the False Prophet Muhammad Son of Abdallah, i.e. The Qur’an
1831
No
1181
This is the first Hungarian translation of the Qur'an by György Gedeon and Imre Buzitai Szeldmayer, published in 1831. The translation is based on Christian Reineccius' revised version of Marracci's Latin rendering of the Qur'an, Mohammedis Filii Abdallae Pseudo-Prophetae Fides Islamitica, i.e. Al-Coranus.
François Rouy, « La religion musulmane dans le Livre de l'Espérance d'Alain Chartier » [archive], Images et signes de l'Orient dans l'Occident médiéval, Senefiance 11, 1982, p. 313-322
The Fatiha is added at the end of the book in Arabic with an interlinear Latin translation. This interlinear translation is Matthias Wasmuth's own, and it is followed by two others, one of which is by Robert of Ketton.
David Nerreter’s newly opened Muḥammadan mosque, in which, following the sixth chapter of Alexander Ross’, “On various religions of the world”, first the beginning of the Mahometan religion, spread, sects, governments, various customs and probable fall, then the entire Qur’an according to the best edition by Ludovico Marracci is translated into German and briefly refuted
Father Jérôme Xavier (1549-1617) had written a book, probably in Persian, titled Mirror Showing the Truth, in defense of the Christian religion. A Persian from Isfahan, Ahmad ibn Zayn al-'Abidin, undertook to refute it in favor of Islam and to attack the principal dogmas of Christianity (al-Murshid fī al-Dīn). The Apologia serves as a formal defense of Christianity against the objections raised by Ahmad ibn Zayn al-'Abidi. It is written in Latin and includes Arabic quotations, particularly from the Qur'an, accompanied by Guadagnoli's Latin translations.
Alcoranus Mahometicus, Das ist: Der Türcken Alcoran
Alcoranus Mahometicus, that is: the Turks’ Alcoran / Religion and Superstition. From which can be learned / When and where their false Prophet Mahomet had his origin and beginning / at what occasion he fabricated and invented his derisory and dotty doctrine / furthermore, on his dreams and beguiling human frippery / In addition to that, on the Turks’ Prayer / Almsgiving / Fasting / and other would-be divine services and ceremonies. Previously translated from Arabic into Italian, and now into the German Language, by Rev. Salomon Schweigger, Preacher at Our Lady’s Church in Nuremberg, together with his preface / printed in three different parts / with appended utile index
Al-Koranum Mahumedanum: Das ist / Der Türcken Religion / Gesetz / und Gottslästerliche Lehr
Al-Koranum Mahumedanum: that is / the Turks’ religion / law / and blasphemous doctrine. / with a scriptural refutation of Jewish fables / Mahumetan dreams; dotty and beguiling human frippery: Including at the beginning Mahumed’s arrival / fictive teaching / and its dissemination: Followed by the Laws and Ceremonies of the Alkoran, together with the fictive paradise: At the end an appendix on present-day life / religion and customs of the Christians in Greece, and in addition to that an essential index
German
1659
Translation
No
2650
This is a significantly augmented and expanded version of Salomon Schweiger's Alcoranus Mahometicus, Das ist: Der Türcken Alcoran. The author is unknown.
Mahomet a Koránról a Koránban, Muhammad about the Qur'an in the Qur'an
1833
Yes
No
2623
Tudományos Gyűjtemény was the first long-lasting, significant Hungarian scientific journal. It was published monthly between 1917 and 1841 in Pest. It featured articles and studies from various scientific fields, covering both natural and social sciences. The printer and publisher was Trattner János Tamás (1789-1824), and its first editor was Fejér György (1766-1851). Among its editors was also Vörösmarty Mihály (1800-1855).
It is an article written by Holéczy Mihály. It was published in the periodical Tudományos Gyűjtemény in 1833. It provides quotations from the Qur'an, the translations of which are based on David Nerreter's German translation.
Institutions of the Arabic Language for the Use of Theology Students, Reduced to the Highest Lines
Latin
1817
Other
Yes
This work is a comprehensive guide to the Arabic language, designed explicitly for theology students. The book aims to provide a structured and systematic approach to learning Arabic, with a focus on theological studies. It includes various tables and charts to aid in the understanding of Arabic grammar and vocabulary.
The Life of Muhammad, translated and compiled from the Qur’an, from the authentic traditions of the Sunna, and from the best Arabic authors
French
1732
Prose
Yes
The work is a landmark early-modern biography that marks a turning point in European writing on Islam. Instead of relying on medieval polemics, Gagnier reconstructs Muhammad’s life from Muslim sources—the Qurʾān, selected ḥadīth, and classical Arabic historians (Abū l-Fidāʾ) —using short translated quotations and frequent paraphrase to anchor events historically. The work remains critical and non-devotional, but its method is new: it treats Islamic texts as primary historical evidence, not targets of refutation. For that reason, it stands between confessional polemic and modern scholarship, paving the way for later Enlightenment historians and the emergence of source-based Islamic studies in Europe. The work itself is based on Boulainvilliers' La vie de Mahomed to which Gagnier supplied direct Arabic sources. He reshaped it into a scholarly, source-based book.
Ewald’s Grammatica critica linguae Arabicae treats the Qurʾān not as a sacred text but as a primary linguistic document of early Arabic: verses are quoted briefly in Arabic, without translation or commentary, solely to illustrate grammatical and syntactic phenomena. By placing Qurʾānic Arabic alongside poetry and prose within a historical framework, Ewald helped establish the modern, critical study of Arabic and laid the groundwork for later scholarly analysis of the Qurʾān as a linguistic corpus.
Le Koran / traduction nouvelle faite sur le texte arabe par M. Kasimirski, Le Koran de Mahomet/ traduction nouvelle faite sur le texte arabe par M. Kasimirski
The Qur’an, a new translation based on the Arabic text, revised and preceded by an introduction
French
1840
Qur'an
Yes
This is one of the most important 19th-century French translations of the Qurʾān, first published in 1840 (Paris). Unlike earlier French versions, it was made directly from the Arabic text, not via Latin intermediaries, and aimed at philological accuracy rather than polemics. The verses of the 114 Suras are numbered.
A Korán. A törökök politikai, társalmi s vallásos törvénykönyvük
A török közélet, szokások s törvények és a Korán. A törököknek társadalmi s vallásos törvénykönyvük
The Qurʾān: the political, social, and religious law-book of the Turks
1854
Prose
Yes
The book, written in Hungarian, not only introduces the Quran but also provides a comprehensive overview of the contemporary Turkish state organization, civil and religious laws, the military, and even the life of the Prophet Muhammad.
Athenaeum. : tudományos criticai és szépmüvészeti folyóirat
Athenaeum
1837
The Athenaeum was a leading Hungarian literary and cultural journal published in Pest from 1837 to 1843 during the Reform Era, founded and edited by Mihály Vörösmarty and József Bajza. It aimed to modernize Hungarian literature and criticism, promote the Hungarian language, and connect national culture with contemporary European intellectual currents. Publishing poetry, prose, essays, and rigorous literary criticism, Athenaeum helped establish professional literary standards in Hungary and played a key role in shaping modern Hungarian literary culture, despite its relatively short lifespan.
It is a short article about the Quran meant to correct the view that it is merely a book to attack the Christian faith. It demonstrates, in a succinct manner, how certain elements from the Bible are present in this book as well.
The Qur’an, translated from the Arabic, accompanied by notes and preceded by a summary of the life of Muḥammad
French
1783
Translation
Although it is claimed that this French version was translated from the original Arabic text, the French text shows that Marracci's Latin translation was used. Such accusations were voiced by Jean-Michel Venture de Paradis and Albin de Kazimirski Biberstein. The edition contains a "summary" of the Prophet's life as well.
The Morals of Mahomet; or, a collection of the purest maxims of the Koran
French
1784
Translation
Yes
This work by Savary, published a year after his Quran translation, is a collection of 224 Quran quotations that present Muhammad not as a "fanatic" but as a wise legislator and moral philosopher.