Translating Verses of Protection: A Qur’ān from Seventeenth-Century Manipa

February 2023

Genie Yoo

Image 1. The first two folios of a copy of a Qur’ān from the island of Manipa in Maluku. The photo on the right shows Sūrat al-Fātiḥa (Q1) and the photo on the left shows Sūrat al-Baqara (Q2). Leiden University Library Special Collections, MS Orient 1945, 1-2.

 

In the last decade of the seventeenth century, five imams on the island of Manipa worked collaboratively to produce a copy of the Qur’ān. On the last page, an unnamed Dutch East India Company (VOC) administrator wrote, “This Qur'ān was written out by Batou Langkaij, an imam of Tomilehou, on Manipa, an island under Ambon, and was checked by four other imams there, in the Christian year of 1694."[i] Manipa was a stepping stone across the narrow sea between the better known islands of Buru and Ambon, the Dutch East India Company’s administrative and commercial center in central Maluku. While the administrator’s brief handwritten note tells us the name and status of the copyist, where it was made, and hints at the correcting process of producing such a copy with four other imams, there is still much we do not know. For instance, who wrote the paratextual materials on the first page, translating the many “contemporary names” of Sūrat al-Fātiḥa, from Arabic to Dutch? Who illustrated the two differently styled cartouches bookending the first and last two pages of this copy? Finally, who wrote the interlinear translations of select surahs and verses into Malay and why? While it is difficult to give definitive answers these questions without further research, this blogpost will focus on fragments of interlinear translations surrounding verses of protection, which believers across the archipelago commonly recited by heart and wrote on talismans for safety and healing.

In contrast to the first two pages, which prominently display motifs resembling European baroque ornamentation (image 1), the last two pages show locally styled cartouches, with indigenous floral motifs, geometric designs with triangular crowns and diagonals, as well as a succession of finial-tipped lines and curves radiating from the borders (image 2).[ii] Significantly, the penultimate page displays four protective Seals of Solomon, which Annabel Teh Gallop has identified as the "Ring of Solomon" in Malay (cincin Suleiman).[iii] The final two pages, moreover, exhibit the last two surahs of the Qur’ān, Sūrat al-Falaq and Sūrat al-Nās, referred to as the two verses of protection, or al-mu‘awwidhatayn. These verses seek the protection of Allah from evils of many kinds, and they both begin in the same way: “Say: I seek the protection of the Lord…” While there are many differences between the Arabic and the Malay vernacular translation of the two surahs, three particular verses caught my attention.

The imam of Tomilehu, Batou Langkaij (likely Batu Langkai or Langkawi), had copied the fourth verse of Sūrat al-Falaq in the following way: 

 

Arabic: “wa min sharri al-naffāthāti fī al-‘uqudi [sic]”[iv] 

[English: and from the evil of the blowers upon the knots]

 

The interlinear translation reads: 

 

Malay translation with some Arabic: “dan daripada kejahatan mantra sihir yang dimembisikkannya [sic] pada sipulan [sic] tali yang disimpul aw siḥr.”[v]

[English: and from the evil of the mantra of sorcery that has been whispered onto the knotting of a rope that is knotted, or sorcery]

 

Here, the translator has expanded on the original “evil of the blowers upon the knots” with “the evil of the mantra of sorcery that has been whispered onto the knotting of a rope.” It elides the feminine plural of al-naffāthāti–women who blow or spit on knots to perform a curse or to cast a spell. In addition to changing the act of blowing (or spitting) to an act of whispering, the translator has used two passive Malay verbs (to be whispered and to be knotted) in a verse that did not contain any verbs. Furthermore, the focus is not on the female actors but on the manifestation of the act itself as “the mantra of sorcery,” from which believers are instructed to seek the protection of Allah. While we cannot be certain, perhaps such interpretations shed light on everyday concerns about keeping oneself safe from sihir (from the Arabic siḥr), sorcery or black magic–the translator’s summary interpretation of the verse as a whole. Allowing this translation to contextualize the visual elements on the page, the protective Seals of Solomon in the four corners of the cartouche come to have added layers of meaning.  

A close reading of this third verse from Sūrat al-Falaq can also help us to understand the translator’s readings of specific words from other verses. For instance, he had already used a form of the Malay word for whisper (bisik), as we saw above. The fourth and the fifth verses of Sūrat al-Nās implores believers to seek the protection of Allah from the evil of the whisperer who whispers. The two verses were separated and copied as follows:

 

            Arabic: “min sharri al-waswās / al-khannās al-ladhī yuwaswisu fī ṣudūr al-nās”[vi]

[English: from the evil of the whisperer / the withdrawer who whispers in the hearts of mankind]

 

The translator would, however, render these verses as:

 

Malay: “daripada segala kejahatan waswas / shaytan yang indari aqil disebut dhikr Allah kan lutuh ia lagi memberi waswas pada segala hati manusia”[vii]

[English: from the evils of misgivings / Satan who evades the intellect called the remembrance of Allah, shall he strike again to put misgivings into the hearts of mankind]

 

Rather than translating “the whisperer” and “to whisper” into Malay, the translator has used the Arabic-derived Malay term waswas, which can mean worry, anxiety, doubt, even suspicion. There is a possibility that the Arabic waswās and the Malay waswas, while related as loan words and now false friends, influenced the translator’s reading and interpretation of the verses. In other words, rather than rendering the Arabic into Malay, he seems to have read the Malay back into the Arabic. Furthermore, the translator has elaborated on al-khannās–literally one who withdraws, referring to the devil–by adding that Satan is one who keeps a distance from dhikr Allah (rememberance of Allah). This addition seems to provide a practical, everyday solution to the devil and his evil influence: perform and maintain dhikr Allah to keep him away.