May Saleh Dec 10, 2009:

I think that our purpose in translating Islamic text is to convey the right message of Allah, and using Arabic words in English without finding an equal meaning in the target language will make difficulty to understand these texts, so may be finding the equal of these words in the religion of other language may make it easier.

Ghada Samir Dec 9, 2009:

i.e Circumambulation "Tawaf" of/around the Kaaba or Ka'bah ?

Ghada Samir Dec 9, 2009:

Good point of view! I find your point of view, Steve, to be very good! So what about using both terminologies to introduce "Tawaf" to the target reader, if he doesn't know about Islam?

Steve Booth Dec 9, 2009:

In some ways I agree however you have to be careful. the word Tawaf is not that common in English dictionaries yet unlike some of the other terminology. another reason to be careful is that often terminology is misunderstood so it is very important to know and understand the target audience. For instance a large number of people will have heard of a fatwa but think it is a death threat from the newspaper concerning the fatwat against Salman rushdie, they will have heard of mujaheddin and think of terrorists, Jihad and think of holy war against the west and if they have heard of intifada will see it as a terrorist insurgency against Israel.
Obviously these words are in very common use now in the west but many people still don't understadn what they mean .
If you are to bring in other terminology like tawaf you run the chance of people not knowing what you are talking about. So although i am not saying that it shouldn't be used i am just advocating careful usage of Arabic or Islamic terms in material aimed at people with little knowledge of Islam apart from what they have been told by some of the newspapers

Osama Shahin Dec 9, 2009:

I do believe that we should stick with our own terminology, as long as they are recognized in many famous dictionaries. Intifada, Jihad, Mujaheddin, fatwa are widespread terms nowadays. Why not using Tawaf too. I totally agree with Muhammad