Apologetic Quran translation No.2 : From “Mary who guarded her private part” to “Mary who guarded her chastity"

How did Mary become pregnant with Jesus according to Islam? The Quran says in 19:17-22 that the angel Gabriel came to Mary in the form of a human and he said to her: “I am only a messenger of your Lord: That I will give you a pure boy”.

How did Gabriel give her this boy? Verse 66:12 says according to the accurate translation of Edward Palmer: “And Mary, daughter of Imran, who guarded her private parts, and we breathed therein of our spirit”.

Quran interpreters gave more details. Ibn Kathir’s interpretation, which is the most popular interpretation today, says regarding verse 66:12 : “God ordered Gabriel to blow into the opening of Mary’s garment. The blow went down and entered her private part.”

The "blowing into garment" part isn’t mentioned in the Quran or any prophetic saying. Yet it has become the standard narrative today. Now to the mistranslations: The verse says ((Mary who guarded her "Farj" فرج )). Farj means private parts. See Lane’s lexicon.

Since that guarding the private parts implies guarding the chastity, two non-Muslim translators alongside the majority of Muslim translators translated “guarded her Farj” as “guarded her chastity”. But more than half of this majority did this for apologetic reasons.

We can know this by looking at their translations of other verses that contain the word فروج “Furuuj” which is the plural of “Farj”. Such as verse: 24:31 ((And say to the believing women that they cast down their looks and guard their private parts (Furuuj).))

http://islamawakend.com lists 51 different translations for every verse of the Quran. This website classifies Quran translations under three categories: 35 translations are described as generally accepted translations. 11 are described as controversial. 5 are by non-Muslims.

Out of the 35 accepted Muslim translators, only five translated Farj in Mary's verse as private parts.

https://t.co/Bv9pPIp0lk?amp=1

But regarding verse 24:31 that orders women to guard their Furuuj, 22 out of the 35 accepted Muslim translators translated Furuuj as private parts.

https://t.co/BlLEQ1i1Il?amp=1

So we have 17 Muslim translators who translated “guard their Furuuj” as “guard their private parts”. But when it came to Mary, they translated “guarded her Farj” as “guarded her chastity”.

You can guess that these translators saw it’s inappropriate to mention the private part of Mary.

Literal word-for-word translations are another proof of the apologetic thinking. The literal translations provided by http://Islamawakened.com and http://Quran.com are based on “The glorious Quran word-for-word translation to facilitate learning of Quranic Arabic" by Dr Shehnaz Sheikh. This work translates “her Farj” as “her chastity”.

The final proof that the translations are apologetic: Translating Farj as anything other than private parts creates a problem: The next part after “guarded her Farj” says: “and we breathed therein of our spirit”. The word “therein” فيه is marked for the masculine gender.

The gender of the word Farj is masculine. If “therein” refers to Mary and not her private part then “therein” should have been marked for the feminine: Fiihaa instead of Fiihi. So the word Fiihi (therein) specifically refers to Mary’s Farj. This is obvious to any Arabic speaker.

Those who translated Farj as private parts didn’t face any problem in translating the word Fiihi: “Mary who guarded her private parts and we blew therein (or into it)”. But those who translated Farj as chastity showed their true apologetic colors when it came to the word Fiihi.

Let’s see how the 35 accepted Muslim translators dealt with the word Fiihi: 14 translated Fiihi as “her”, meaning: We blew into her (Mary) of our spirit. (See Shakir's translation). This translation contradicts the gender of the word Fiihi. The word simply cannot refer to Mary.

6 translated Fiihi as “into her womb” which is the best translation among the apologetic ones. But it’s still inaccurate since that Quranic Arabic has a word for womb: رحم raHm. The verse didn’t say “Mary who guarded her raHm so we breathed therein”. Farj cannot mean womb.

5 translated Farj as “private parts” so they translated Fiihi correctly. 3 translators, including Yusuf Ali the most popular translator (See the pic), translated Fiihi as “into her body”. 4 translated it as just “there in” or “into it” without explaining in what or into what.

2 translators, including Sahih International, translated it as into her sleeve or her garment. Which has no basis in the Quran or Hadith. 1 translated it as into her baby!

As for the 5 non-Muslim translators: Palmer has the most accurate translation: "Guarded her private parts and we breathed therein." Arberry is the most apologetic since that he translates "Furuuj" in 24:31 as "private parts" but in Mary's verse he translates Farj as virginity. He also mistranslates Fiihi as "into her (Mary)"

The remaining 3 non-Muslim translators were less apologetic than Arberry. Although they didn't translate "Farj" as private parts, they were consistent in that they didn't translate Furuuj in other verses as private parts either.

They also translated Fiihi as "into whose womb" which is better than "into her (Mary)".