Ahmed Ali

Synonymy in the Glorious Qur?an: Problems Explored & Strategies Adopted Ahmed Ali

In translating the meanings of the Qur??n, a translator may ?face some problems related to synonymy. In other words, any ?translator may fail to find an adequate equivalent if s/he cannot ?distinguish, for example, between faqr, iml?q and ??ylah, dhulm, ?bagh? and jawr, and al-Zam?n, al- Dahr, al-Amad and al-Muddah, etc. ?In this regard, a distinction must be made between these various ?synonyms so as to convey the content without much loss. Thus, any ?translator should be fully aware of the nature of the original text, its ?form, style, and syntactic structure as well as the TL norms. This ?undoubtedly shows the importance of the role undertaken by any ?translator during the process of translating the meanings of the ?Qur??n. This issue is very problematic because linguists are divided ?into two parties. The first defends the existence of synonymy and ?admits that the Glorious Qur??n abounds in synonyms. The second ?rejects the occurrence of synonymy in natural languages in general ?and in the Glorious Qur??n in particular, believing that every single ?word conveys a distinctive meaning that cannot be substituted by ?another word.?