I’ve been studying Arabic for my career and I thought it’d be fun to read the dhamma in Arabic too. I checked SuttaCentral and found nothing, except the website got a bit glitchy for some reason. Checking google doesn’t lead to any translations, just stats of Buddhist living in Arabic speaking countries. I’m sure Islamic scholars would have taken a crack at the Pali canon since they love a good literary debate, but I’m not sure where to look now.
Does anyone have any leads on where I can find translations of Pali Canon into Arabic (or any Buddhist canon perhaps)?
The translation in the link you provided is of the Karaniya Metta Sutta. The translator uses slang Egyptian version of Arabic. I Personally did not enjoy reading it! I think the translation by Saadi Yousef of the Dhammapada is much better.
@ZenKen some Arabic poems written by Islamic scholars are very Dhammic. You might enjoy the following two:
Would one of our Arabic-speaking friends perhaps be able to give a translation of the copyright notice page (unfortunately the pdf seems to be an image rather than selectable text, so I can’t use Google Translate)? Could be worth checking to see if there’s a possibility this can be added to SC.
You are not allowed to publish any part of this book, or save its content, or transferring it, in any way including electronic or photocopying or any other method, unless you obtain a written permission from the publisher.
I found a different copy by a different translator who does not seem Arab in origin. I did not find any copy rights restrictions on this copy and it includes a general introduction to the Dhammapada and the Dhamma in general
The website itself is dedicated to teach the Dhamma in Arabic
@Dhammanando thanks for the Dhamapada, I’ll also look up the Saedi Yusuf and see what else I can find.
Maybe I didn’t dig deep enough…
And I do enjoy sufi poetry @Bundokji, that’s why I wanted to see their take on translating the the Dhamma! I’m new to Arabic and so I found the classic Arabic in the easier to follow in that translation of the Dhammapada too. Also thanks for the Dhamma website in Arabic! You’ve given me a lot to study!
Thank you everyone for the start! I’d be happy to see if anyone finds anything else to add.
It seems that this translation has been corrected and re-uploaded three times, but without the site owner removing the earlier versions. This is the most recent one, uploaded in March this year: