Prophet in historical and contemporary translations of the Bible and the Koran

Joanna Kulwicka-Kamińska

Uniwersytet Mikołaja Kopernika w Toruniu

Abstract

The article attempts to analyze different ways of translating words referring to “a prophet” from Arabic into Slavonic languages in Tatar writings of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (GDL) and Polish translations of the Koran in comparison to prophet designations present in the Polish translations of the Bible. It is also an attempt to find out whether collocations with the word prophet present in the GDL Tatar writings and Polish translations of the Koran are characteristic of this type of texts when the so called Koran phraseology is created, and whether and to what extent they reflect biblical phraseology or general Polish lexis. If they do reflect this, the scope and nature of the relations between biblical and Koranic translations will be determined.Moreover, the image of a prophet emerging from biblical and Koranic translations is presented. The source material are texts which vary with regard to formality and time since the source of the vocabulary excerption are both Polish translations of the Koran and the GDL Tatar historic works written in Arabic script that require transcription and transliteration, as well as Polish translations of the Bible from the 16th and 17th centuries and contemporary ones.