Don’t Abuse the Concept of Jihad: Grand Mufti

Posted by Mohamed Imtiaz Bhikoo

Staff Writer, IslamicSurf
mbhikoo@worldonline.co.za

RIYADH, 22 August 2003 — Saudi Arabia’s highest religious authority urged Muslims yesterday to shun extremism and avoid waging unjustified jihad as the Kingdom cracks down on militants. In a lengthy statement, Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdul Aziz Al-Sheikh told Saudis to listen to their religious authorities and ignore fanatical interpretations of Islam.

“One of the fallouts from extremism in understanding Islam is that some people call for jihad for the sake of God without justification,” Sheikh Abdul Aziz said. “These people raise the banner of jihad to draw the young into their ranks and not to fight for God,” he added.

Militants like Al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden have often called for jihad against countries they consider “infidel” such as the United States, urging his followers to target Western interests in Saudi Arabia and abroad.

Other militants have also used Islam as a rallying cry, justifying attacks by saying they are doing God’s will.

“Young Muslims must try and better themselves and their country but not through violence, because Islam is not a violent religion, it is a merciful religion,” he said.
“A Muslim must understand his religion. It is the duty of the young and the whole Muslim world to know that violence is not a way to achieve reform,” Al-Sheikh said.

The grand mufti emphasized that the struggle against a perceived evil should not lead to a greater evil.

“The Prophet (peace be upon him) told us to combat evil. But there is a general rule to look at both advantages and disadvantages. And if fighting an evil leads to a greater one, then that fight is forbidden,” he said.

The grand mufti said one of the reasons some people attacked and frightened others was ignorance.

“Ignorance is a killer disease because a person thinks that he is right when he is wrong,” he said and stressed the importance of right guidance. “One of the reasons also is mistrust of our scholars. It is people’s duty to trust their scholars and leaders,” he said.

Last week, the Kingdom’s highest Islamic authority denounced terror attacks in the Kingdom, describing them as “serious criminal acts,” and pledged its full support for the government.
“Acts of sabotage such as bombings, murder and destruction of property are serious criminal acts and an aggression against innocent people... which warrant severe and deterrent punishment,” the Council of Senior Islamic Scholars said in a statement.

The 17-member council, headed by the grand mufti, declared its support for the actions being taken by the state to track down terrorists in an effort to shield the country from their actions.
The Islamic body had called on the Saudi people to “stand behind the country’s leadership and their scholars,” at these difficult times in the fight against “evildoers.”

The statement dubbed “misguided and ignorant” those who claim that terrorism was part of jihad, or holy war. It said people who provide shelter to suspected militants were committing a “grave sin.”

Islam and the Feminist Movement

Islam and the feminist movement: Confrontation or Cooperation?
by Abdul Hamid Lachporia hajee@sympatico.ca

Whether living in the Middle East or Africa, Central Asia, Pakistan, Southeast Asia, Europe or the Americas, Muslim women tend to view the feminist movement with some apprehension. Although there are some features of the feminist cause with which we as Muslims would wish to join hands, other features generate our disappointment and even opposition. There is therefore no simple or "pat" answer to the question of the future cooperation or competition which feminism may meet in an Islamic environment.

The goals of feminism as conceived in Western society are not necessarily relevant or exportable across cultural boundaries. Feminism as a Western movement originated in England during the 18th century. It had as one of its main goals the eradication of legal disabilities imposed upon women by English common law. These laws were especially discriminatory of married women. They were derived in part from Biblical sources e.g., the idea of man and woman becoming "one flesh," and the attribution of an inferior and even evil nature to Eve and all her female descendants. The Industrial Revolution and its need for women's contribution to the work force brought strength to the feminist movement and helped its advocates gradually break down most of those discriminatory laws.

Since the history and heritage of Muslim peoples have been radically different from that of Western Europe and America, the feminism which would appeal to Muslim women and to the society in generally must be correspondingly different. Those legal rights which Western women sought in reform of English common law were already granted to Muslim women in the 7th century. Such a struggle therefore holds little interest for the Muslim woman. In addition, it would be useless to try to interest Muslim women in ideas or reforms that run diametrically in opposition to those traditions which form an important part of our cultural and religious heritage. If feminism is to succeed in an Islamic environment, it must be an indigenous form of feminism, rather than one conceived and nurtured in an alien environment with different problems and different solutions and goals.

If the goals of Western feminism are not viable for Muslim women, what form should an Islamic feminist movement take to ensure success? Above all, the movement must recognize that; whereas in the West, the mainstream of the women's movement has viewed religion as one of the chief enemies of its progress and well being, Muslim women view the teachings of Islam as their best friend and supporter. The prescriptions that are found in the Quran and in the example of the Prophet Muhammad, are regarded as the ideal to which contemporary women wish to return. As far as Muslim societies are concerned, the source of any difficulties experienced by women today is not Islam and its traditions, but certain alien ideological intrusions on our societies, ignorance, and distortion of true Islam, or exploitation by individuals within the society.

Second, any feminism, which is to succeed in an Islamic environment, must be one, which does not work chauvinistically for women's interest alone. Islamic traditions would dictate that women's progress be achieved in tandem with the wider struggle to benefit all members of the society. The good of the group or totality is always more crucial than the good of any one sector of the society. In fact, the society is seen as an organic whole in which the welfare of each member or organ is necessary for the health and well being of every other part. Disadvantageous circumstances of women therefore should always be countered in conjunction with an attempt to alleviate those factors, which adversely affect men and other segments of the society.

Islam and Islamic traditions therefore are seen today by many Muslims as the main source of cohesiveness for nurturing an identity and stability to confront intruding alien influences and the cooperation needed to solve their numerous contemporary problems. To fail to note this fact, or to fail to be fully appreciative of its importance for the average Muslim - whether male or female - would be to commit any movement advocating improvement of women's position in Islamic lands to certain failure. It is only through establishing that identity and stability that self-respect can be achieved and a healthier climate for both Muslim men and Muslim women will emerge. We pray to Almighty Allah Jallah Wa'ala to bring us from darkness into light, to bless uswith knowledge of His Revelations, to teach us wisdom and to help us togrow morally, intellectually and spiritually.

Ameen Ya Rabbul Ala'meen!

Dualism & Unity in Muhammad Iqbal's Thought

Dualism & Unity
in Muhammad Iqbal’s Thought
By Dr Soumaya Ghanoushi*

A theologian, philosopher, jurist and poet, Muhammad Iqbal is the expression of the synthetic organic nature of the Islamic system of ideas, which knows no chasm separating the ideal and the real, the life within and the one that abides without, the spiritual and the temporal. Whether in prose or in verse form, the writings of Iqbal are permeated by the illumination of the Quranic spirit of unity through and through, such that each of his thoughts mirrors all the others and the whole all at once. The idea of unity is, indeed, the bane of Iqbal’s system of thought around which all-else falls. The traditional dualisms plaguing human thought since the time of the Greeks are denounced by him as spurious, merely serving to shatter the organic wholeness of reality, bifurcating what is in fact a unity into painful oppositions between a subject that entertains thoughts, knows, speaks and acts and an object contemplated, known, spoken and acted upon. In the relation between the human and the divine, such dualisms dictate the vision of an estranged God, which the universe confronts as its other independently standing in opposition to Him within the void receptacle of infinite space. The ultimate being is thus either a passive spectator who, having manufactured his article, motionless gazes upon it from afar -creation being but an accidental event in his life history, or a domineering tyrant who sways over the human world stifling it whenever it rears its head with a faint desire of coming to its own. Any victory the human scores over the forces of nature obstructing his march is a blow to the authority of the oppressive supra-mundane sovereign.

In response to its self-fashioned dualisms the Western mind sought refuge either in a philosophy of salvation that preached world abnegation, thereby casting the believer in a permanent state of tension with the external world, or in a philosophy of materialism that dissolved the individual and the divine alike into the determinism of an over-mechanised cosmos. It thereby abolished the reign of transcendence, to inaugurate that of immanence. To the elimination of all transcendental referents from knowledge and ethics and the perception of the human situation as purely temporal is traceable the crisis of nihilism and relativity of values characteristic of our times. Only with the admittance of the unity of reality can a scheme of human existence aspiring at meaning be conceivable. Such is the greatest service Islam may render human thought, one the essence of which is embodied in what is in fact its foundation stone: the idea of Tawheed that affirms the radical monotheism of this religion. This is the recognition that “reality is essentially spirit”. All the immensity of matter that is the universe down to its smallest details is the expression of the ultimate reality as it reveals itself to the sense perception of man. As Iqbal puts it, “the world, in all its details from the mechanical movement of what we call the atom of matter to the free movement of thought in the human ego, is the self revelation of the ‘Great I am’”. Talk of ‘the profane’ as opposed to ‘the spiritual’ becomes wholly redundant, since the material is nothing but the revelation of the spiritual within the conditions of sensory experience. The Prophet of Islam puts it so beautifully when he says: “The whole of this earth is a mosque”. The ‘religious’ and the so-called ‘secular’ are so intensely intermingled as to render even the suggestion that the two are sides of the one same object utterly absurd.

The religious as such is as current and extended as the soil of this earth, recognising no restrictions, or the monopoly of an official institution or hierarchy. It is in this context that Iqbel repudiates the model of the theocratic state founded on the institutionalisation of the religious and the sacralisation of politics. Equally objectionable is the secular instrumental Hobbesian state that admits of no moorings or categorical imperatives outside itself, motivated by nothing but a blind unrestrained pursuit of power and national, or tribal glory. This Iqbali vision of the nature of the state has its roots in the works of his forefather the great Muslim historian Ibn Khaldun who deems the sphere of the political one of ijtihad anchored on the balancing of religious interests and detriments, and also one of consensus established on the legitimacy which the ummah bestows upon it. Indeed, although Ibn Khaldun views politics as intrinsic to Islam itself - as opposed to Christianity which, he maintains, is structured around spiritual redemption, and as such is alien to the political which, under the sway of historical developments, it was compelled to espouse, he declares its realm one of free interpretation or ijtihad, but one which receives its guidance from two limits, horizontally from the consensus of the wide community of believers and vertically from the spiritual directives of Islam or the shari’ah, which is itself immanent within the ummah.

Neither a sacred religious vocation, nor a secular instrumental affair, politics is the terrain of a historically embodied reason shepherded by the light of God. Though it is superior to its natural counterpart that rests on the sole element of force, the rational state sees itself incorporated within the revelational state (dawlat al-shar’’) and elevated to the level of spiritual activity with reason receiving its illumination from the glorious light of God. This is indeed the political order Muslims must aspire at realising, one the essence of which is the synthesis of the revelational state and the rational state. For this, it would seem, is their sole way out of a one-way road that ends either in secularism or in theocracy. And this is without a doubt truest to the spirit of their
Islamic religion.

* Soumaya Ghanoushi (PhD) is a Writer and Researcher, London, England
Source: http://www.islam21.net/

Perempuan-perempuan dalam hidup Noordin M. Top

Inilah Perempuan-Perempuan dalam Hidup Noordin M Top

Jul 30, 2009

Gembong teroris Indonesia Noordin M Top adalah orang yang paling dicari polisi. Aksi kejamnya meledakkan bom di sejumlah tempat di Jakarta menewaskan banyak orang tak berdosa. Terakhir, serangan terhadap Hotel JW Marriott dan Ritz Carlton juga diduga didalangi lelaki asal Malaysia ini.

Nama Noordin mulai dikenal setelah peristiwa Bom Bali I tahun 2002. Selama ini, polisi telah berhasil menangkah puluhan orang yang terkait jaringan terorisme di Indonesia, tapi selalu gagal menangkap Noordin. Itu artinya, selama tujuh tahun ia menjadi buronan polisi.
Hidup di pelarian tampaknya begitu mudah bagi Noordin. Memang, kita tidak tahu bagaimana perjuangan dia hidup dalam persembunyian. Namun, satu jejak jelas yang ditinggalkan Noordin adalah sejumlah wanita yang berhasil disuntingnya. Dalam pelariannya, Noordin masih sempat menikah dan punya anak. Berapa banyak istri Noordin M Top hingga kini tidak ada yang tahu pasti.

Pascaledakan bom di Hotel JW Marriott dan Ritz Carlton, Jumat 17 Juli 2009 lalu, yang paling santer disebut sebagai istri Noordin adalah Ariani Rahma alias Arina. Kepada Arina, Noordin mengenalkan diri dengan nama samaran Abdul Halim.

Makanya, Arina mengaku sangat syok begitu tahu pria yang dinikahinya pada 2006 lalu itu ternyata teroris yang paling dicari di negeri ini.

Istri Noordin M Top yang dicokok dari rumahnya di Desa Pesuruhan, Kecamatan Binangun Cilacap, Jawa Tengah, itu mengira Noordin adalah seorang guru di sebuah pesantren di Makassar. Noordin sendiri memang jarang di rumah.

Dari pernikahan sirinya dengan Noordin, Arina mendapatkan dua orang anak yakni Haula yang berusia 2,5 tahun dan Daud yang masih berusia satu tahun.

Wanita lain di BogorTidak hanya Arina, Densus 88 juga mengamankan seorang wanita yang diduga istri Noordin yang lain. Wanita yang belum diketahui identitasnya ini diciduk dari rumahnya di Cianten, Kecamatan Leuwiliang, Kabupaten Bogor. Wanita ini kemudian diamankan di Markas Brimob, Kelapa Dua, Cimanggis.

Wanita lain lagi di Riau

Densus 88 juga terus melacak istri Noordin yang berada di luar Pulau Jawa. Persisnya di wilayah Kabupaten Rokan Hilir (Rohil), Riau. Noordin sempat menetap selama satu tahun di daerah ini. Di daerah ini, Noordin menikahi seorang perempuan yang identitasnya belum diketahui. Polisi masih melacak istri dan anak Noordin yang kabarnya pergi ke Malaysia.

Munfiatun al Fitri

Sebelumnya Noordin juga pernah beristrikan Munfiatun al Fitri. Wanita yang dinikahinya secara siri pada 22 Juni 2004 ini disebut-sebut sebagai istri kedua Noordin. Pernikahan antara Munfiatun dan Noordin berlangsung di Surabaya dengan emas kawin berupa cincin emas dan akad nikah menggunakan bahasa Arab.

Dari sekian istri Noordin, Munfiatun mungkin yang paling apes. Ia harus mendekam selama tiga tahun di penjara pada Juni 2005 lalu atas dakwaan bersalah menyembunyikan pelaku pengeboman. Munfiatun dibebaskan pada 2007. Saat berada di penjara, ia mengajukan cerai terhadap Noordin.

Sumber:kompas.com

Indonesia Holds Fast to Secular Politics

Indonesia Holds Fast To Secular Politics

Islamist Groups Expected to Take Back Seat in Vote
By Robin Shulman

Washington Post Staff Writer

Thursday, April 9, 2009; A08

DEPOK, Indonesia -- Ismi Safeya is a student at an Islamic school who veils her hair for modesty, prays five times a day and is inspired by the idea of a society based on Muslim principles.

But when the 18-year-old casts her vote for the first time in parliamentary elections Thursday, she won't vote for an Islamist party.

"The wisest choice is a government not dependent on Islamic law," she said, acknowledging the religious diversity of Indonesia and arguing that rules must be fair for everyone. "Islam actually guides our lives, but it doesn't seem to be shown in the way we vote."

Like Safeya, most voters here in the world's largest majority-Muslim country are expected to cast their ballots for secular parties. As political Islam gains strength globally, it has achieved little electoral success in Indonesia. Though polls show Indonesians becoming more religiously observant in their private lives, surveys also suggest this shift will not translate into significant support for Islamist politics in parliamentary elections Thursday or in presidential elections scheduled for July.

"More and more young Muslims are interested in basic bread-and-butter issues," said Defense Minister Juwono Sudarsono in an interview in his office in Jakarta, the capital. "Parties that advocate for sharia, or Islamic law, do not get much play."

One of the reasons is that Islamist parties have won local elections in the past. But instead of building strength for the parties' ideals, experiments with Islamic law have produced a backlash. Meanwhile, mainstream parties have co-opted some positions of their Islamist opponents. Religious positions have seeped into the national consensus, neutralizing them as campaign platforms for the Islamist parties.

"The categories are blurred right now," said Andi Mallarangeng, a spokesman for President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, a member of the secular Democratic Party. "To win, you have to move to the center." The center, he said, fuses moderate Islamic ideals with programs to deliver such economic basics as jobs and food.

"Islamic political parties exist and will always have a niche in this electorate," Mallarangeng said. "But they're not going to dominate."

In the last national election, in 2004, Islamist parties, broadly defined, received about 40 percent of the vote. This time, they are projected to receive only about 24 percent, according to a poll conducted by the Indonesian Survey Institute. Secular parties are expected to win about 67 percent of the vote, although the polls have been off in the past. Not all of the Islamist parties advocate sharia rule, and many are backing away from such platforms.

A big part of the challenge for religious-themed parties is the extraordinary diversity of this archipelagic nation, which is made up of more than 14,000 islands and includes tolerance among its core principles. About 90 percent of people in this, the world's fourth most populous country, are Muslim. But they practice a unique, syncretic brand of Southeast Asian Islam. Traditions include banging a cowhide drum alongside the call of the muezzin to summon people to prayer, a belief in neighborhood spirits and rituals such as one in which new fathers of baby girls dress up as women.

Thursday's elections feature 38 national parties competing for Indonesia's 550-seat parliament, a regional representation council, and provincial, county and city assemblies. Parties or coalitions that get 20 percent or more of the parliamentary seats may nominate a candidate for presidential elections scheduled for July 9.

The campaigns have been going strong for weeks, with processions of activists on mopeds waving banners and chanting party slogans in the streets of Jakarta day and night. Indonesians who show up at rallies often get gifts -- T-shirts, lunches or even 20,000 rupiah notes, worth about $2.

Corruption is the biggest problem Indonesians cite in their government, and in the last election, that was part of the appeal of the religious parties, which are traditionally seen as cleaner. But since then, a few representatives of Islamist parties have been tainted by scandal. Some Indonesians say they are disenchanted this time around and will simply not vote.
"We're so disappointed with the leaders," said Shohib Sirri, 21, a student in the English and letters department at the State Islamic University.

During President Suharto's 32-year dictatorship, which ended in 1998, he drew support from Islamist organizations that helped the government round up suspected opponents. Suharto allowed more freedom for Islamic groups than for political ones, and during his last years in power he helped foster a generation of Islamist activists, said Zulkieflimansyah, a member of parliament from the Islamic-oriented Prosperous Justice Party.

After the U.S.-backed Suharto fell from power, there was a torrent of repressed political activity, including expressions of radical Islam. The Bali nightclub bombings in 2002, which killed more than 200 people, announced the presence of a violent fringe. Those responsible, from the Indonesian chapter of the transnational organization Jemaah Islamiyah, a group linked to al-Qaeda, were arrested or went into hiding in the Philippines.

In 2004, a law allowed for local elections, and dozens of communities elected officials who experimented with versions of Islamic law -- from requiring women to wear a head scarf when working in government offices, to preventing women from being outside alone at night.
But when the rules were imposed, people reacted against them. Many Indonesians were repulsed by the arrests of women waiting for rides to work before the evening shifts at factories, or raids on hotel rooms to catch unmarried people together. The Islamist parties began to back down from talk of Islamic law.

"It's not a vote getter," said James Castle, an analyst of Indonesian politics and economics.
But some see a generational divide between younger Indonesians who are prepared to fuse Islamic values with democracy, and older Indonesians who lived most of their lives under Suharto and now seek Islamic law. "If we don't speak about sharia Islam, we will lose our base," said Zulkieflimansyah, who like many Indonesians goes by one name. He hopes for a country "with democracy in our political system and Islam as our moral code."

Elsewhere, Zulkieflimansyah said, Islamist movements are using violence to protect themselves from undemocratic regimes. "Here it is quite irrelevant," he said. "In Indonesia, the Islamist movements are in government."

Politicians from the ruling party have taken stances designed to curry favor with religious voters, such as backing an anti-pornography bill that was pushed by the Islamist parties and supporting curtailed freedoms of a minority sect of Islam that is not recognized by some religious authorities. Analysts say that Indonesia shares some attributes with Turkey, where a party rooted in political Islam gained national power, only to experience a setback in recent local elections. Indonesia could also be taking leads from Malaysia, where Islamist parties have not fared well in the past two elections.

"The most important thing is to create jobs and security," said Emy Widijanti, 39, a travel agent, sitting at a table outdoors in a narrow street full of stands selling steaming beef and chicken in peanut sauce. "Indonesia is diverse. Government should protect all religious belief."

Syed Amir 'Ali and His Thought

SYED AMĪR ‘ALĪ AND HIS THOUGHT
By Machnun Husein
[Former Senior Lecturer in Islamic Studies, the Jakarta Muhammadiyah University]

To almost every student of Islam, Syed Amīr ‘Alī (1849-1928) is invariably recognized as a Muslim thinker of India who is, like Shaikh Muhammad ‘Abduh (1849-1905) of Egypt, not only well known to Muslims in his own country but also those in other countries as well. Although he is a Shi‘ite by origin, his works, especially his Spirit of Islam, occupy a leading place among the classics of modernism in Egypt, and they have furnished materials and arguments for a great number of articles, pamphlets, lectures, and books (Gibb, 1978:70-1). It is reasonable, therefore, to say that he has a considerable influence to the Muslims by and large, rather than those committed only in the Shi‘ite sect.

To the students of Islam of the West, the name of Amīr ‘Alī is also familiar enough because he is perhaps the second Muslim thinker, after Sir Syed Ahmad Khān (1817-98), who communicates Islam to the people of the West in English. Not only do they recognize him as a modern Muslim thinker, but also regard him as the biggest apologist the Muslim World has ever produced. As H.A.R. Gibb stated, he is one of several scholars in the generation after Sir Syed Ahmad Khān who works out of a new Muslim liberal apologetic and ideology, which has replaced for thousands (if not millions) of Muslims the traditional presentation – and that not only in India but throughout the Muslim world (Gibb, 1978:59).

According to Gibb, this apologetic is primarily directed toward other Muslims in order to maintain their inner loyalty to Islam (Gibb, 1978:68), while the object of the apologists is the prove the divinely-inspired origin of the Islamic religion and way of life, in order to establish and strengthen the foundations of an ethic which would otherwise stand exposed and helpless before the subtle assaults of secularism (Gibb, 1978:53).

It is obvious that Amīr ‘Alī’s work is almost entirely apologetic and defensive, and even in some cases, especially in the case of Christianity, he tends to be an offender (Maqsood Ahmad, 1988:103) or a controversialist, to borrow Gibb’s terminology, who primarily directs against Christianity and against the attacks of Christian missionaries (Gibb, 1978:68). What Gibb has said above is, in fact, quite true and even, according to me, it is a conditio sine qua non to anybody professing any religion: he is an apologist in as much as he should be sure and assure anyone else that the religion he is professing is true while, at the same time, other religions are not true. In other words, whatever one says about Amīr ‘Alī, he is a modern Muslim thinker and has some thought on Islam, in spite of possible differences from those of others. He has, as Farquhar remarks in his Modern Religious Movement (1967:97), double aim in view: (1) to defend Islam from Christian criticism and the corroding influences of Western thought in general, and (2) to prove that the religious, social, moral, and political reforms which, through Christian teachings, modern thought and the pressure of the times, are being inevitably forced on Muhammadan society and are in full consonance with Islam (Maqsood Ahmad, 1988:103). Though the second aim of Amīr ‘Alī, as stated by Farquhar, is open to question, I propose to say nothing about it save that Amīr ‘Alī is indeed greatly influenced by Western thought and culture.
This short article is not intended to deal with Amīr ‘Alī and his thought in detail but rather to jot down some of his religious thought with a slight comment so as to show, at least, his position among other modern Muslim thinkers, especially, of his day.

Amīr ‘Alī’s brief Biography

Amīr ‘Alī was born in Cuttack, Oressa, India, on April 6, 1949 and died in Sussex, England, on August 3, 1928. He was surnamed “Sayyid” [Syed] as the descendant of the Prophet Muhammad (p.b.u.h). In his memoirs appeared in some issues of Heyderabad’s Islamic Culture, between October 1931 – October 1932, he traces his family origin to the 8th Twelver’s Shi‘ite Imām [Syī‘ah Ithnā ‘Ashariyya], ‘Alī al Rizā, who was buried in the city of Mashhad, Khurāsān, at the northeast Persia (Anis Ahmad, 1980:54; Maqsood Ahmad, 1988:102-3).

It was around this city that Amīr ‘Alī’s ancestors were settled before they moved to India. His great grandfather, Ahmad Afzal Khān, an officer in the army of the famous Nadīr Shah and the commander in chief at the Khurāsān contingent, plundered Delhi, the capital city of Mughal sultanate, during the rule of Muhammad Shah. On the request of the Sultan Mughal he settled in India taking 7,000 cavalries with him (Anis Ahmad, 1980:54).

When Delhi was attacked by the Marhattas’ troops, he did his best to defend the city but, unfortunately, he was killed in the battle. His son, Muhammad Tāhir, took refuge in Lahore, a city in the north, and, at the request of Shuja‘ al Daulah, the ruler of Oudh, he joined the army. Muhammad Tāhir has a son, Mansūr ‘Alī Khān alias Munawwar ‘Alī Khān, and the latter has also a son, Sa‘ādat ‘Alī Khān, who is Amīr ‘Alī’s father (Anis Ahmad, 1980:54; Maqsood Ahmad, 1988:101).

Unlike his father and grandfathers, Sa‘ādat ‘Alī took part in neither the army nor the polity. He was graduated from a medical school and had, therefore, been working as a physician. He made extensive journeys around the whole country before he finally settled in Cuttack where his five sons were born. And Amīr ‘Alī was the fourth of them (Anis Ahmad, 1980:55).

Sa‘ādat ‘Alī wanted his children to have the best education so he decided to move to Calcutta where he sent Amīr ‘Alī and three of his brothers to en English school. But life in Calcutta did not seem agreeable to him so that he eventually, at the suggestion of one of his close friends, Syed Karāmat ‘Alī, the mutawakkil (custodian) of the Muhsin Endowment or the Shi‘ite Mosque in Hoogly, moved to Hoogly and transferred his sons to the Muhsiniyyat College in that city. In the meantime, he also invited a maulvi (Islamic scholar) to his house to tutor his children in fundamental Islamic teachings as well as Persian and Urdu languages (Anis Ahmad, 1980:55).

Amīr ‘Alī, after finishing his studies in Hoogly advanced his studies in the Faculty of Arts and Law at the Calcutta University, from where he earned his M. A. Degree in Law in 1868; and he was the first IndianMuslim who earned such a degree. Soon afterwards, on the advice of Robert Thwaytes, then Principal of the Muhsiniyyat College, he applied for a scholarship for higher studies in England. He gained this scholarship and sailed for England in 1869. After finishing his studies with a Ph. D. Degree in Law in 1873 he returned to India and became a lecturer in Islamic Law at the Presidency College in Calcutta for 5 years (1873-7) (Maqsood Ahmad, 1988:102).

In 1877 he founded the National Muhammadan Association in Calcutta, the first Muslim political organization in India, which soon had 34 chapters throughout the country. It became de facto and even de jure representative organization of the Indian Muslim Community (Anis Ahmad, 1980:57; Wilfred Cantwell Smith, 1979:21-2). At first this association was supported by Sir Syed Ahmad Khān, who was also known as the founder of the Aligarh Muhammadan-Oriental College, but in 1884 he declined to support this association because, according to him, it might cause what he called communal friction among the people of India. He tended to be a pure nationalist and wanted to unite all the people of India regardless of what religion they belong to.

It is well known when he said:
Do you not inhabit the same land? … Remember that the words Hindu and Mahomedan are only meant for religious distinction – otherwise all persons, whether Hindu or Mahomedan even the Christians who reside in this country, are all in the particular respect belonging to one and the same nation (Smith, 1979:21).

In 1878 he served as a magistrate at Calcutta and, in the same year, he became a member of the Bengal Legislative Council. The following year he was appointed Chief Presidency Magistrate, a very unusual appointment for an Indian at that time, and in 1883 he became one of the three Indian additional legislative members of the Governor-General’s Council. He held the Tagore Law professorship at the University of Calcutta for two years (1884-5), and in 1890 he was appointed a judge of the Calcutta High Court and held this office until 1904, in which he retired and settled permanently in England until his death in 1928 (Maqsood Ahmad, 1988:102; Anis Ahmad, 1980:57; Harun Nasution, 1987:182).

From the above analysis one conclusion may be drawn that Amīr ‘Alī is not only known as a jurist, but also a scholar and even a political leader. In addition, one should not forget that he is also a historian of Islam. His fame as a historian is even much bigger than as a jurist because of among other facts that he wrote several books on History, including A Critical Examination of the Life and Teaching of Muhammad, his first book on Islamic History and even the first presentation of Islam by a Muslim in English (Maqsood Ahmad, 1988:103).

As to why he is interested in history may be of great importance to know. Amīr ‘Alī, from his childhood was fond of reading. In one of his memoirs appeared in Islamic Culture of October 1931 issue, he said:

I was a voracious reader, and had finished most of Gibbon’s Decline and Fall [of the Roman Empire] before I was twelve. Although many parts were too difficult for me to understand, and I needed to read over and over again later, the picture of the Roman Empire and its development and the march of the conquering legions enthralled me. But the sixth volume in which the historian describes the rise of the Saracenic power I found especially fascinating (Anis Ahmad, 1980:55).

It is his interest in reading history as well as literature books, especially Gibbon’s Decline and Fall, that grows his intention of being, some time in the future, an expert in Islamic History.

His Works in Brief

Amīr ‘Alī is a prolific writer. Not only did he write essays and articles for several media but also wrote books. As stated before, his first book is A Critical Examination of the Life and Teaching of Muhammad. Amīr ‘Alī said that half of it had been written by his father before he died. He completed the book in 1872 when he was still in London and successfully published it the following year (Anis Ahmad, 1980:55-7).

He wrote about 9 books, some of which are translated into Urdu language. But the most well known of them are The Spirit of Islam (first published in 1899) and A History of the Saracens (first published in 1889). Unlike his other books, his Spirit of Islam not only deals with history but also with religious matters. The first part, “The Life and Ministry of the Prophet,” specifically deals with the history of Muhammad, while the second one, “The Spirit of Islam,” deals with the teachings of Islam comprehensively. Almost all of his thought on religion are included in this part.

In his preface Amīr ‘Alī said that the book was an attempt "to give the history of the evolution of Islam as a world-religion; of its rapid spread and the remarkable hold it obtained over the conscience and minds of millions of people within a short space of time." (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:vii).

According to M. A. Karandikar in his article, “Islam in Indian Politics,” this ook marks the beginning of a new trend among educated Indian Muslims to develop a new interpretation of Islam at the time they started wavering in their loyalty towards the British, i.e. Islam is superior to all other religions including Christianity (Attas Singh, 1976:80).

His Fundamental Thoughts on Religion

According to Amīr ‘Alī the religion of Islam is not called after the name of Muhammad, although he is is founder as the Westerners usually say. The word Islam itself is derived from the word salām or salāma which has two meanings: (1) to be tranquil, at rest, to have done one’s duty, to have paid up, or to be at perfect peace, and (2) to surrender oneself to Him with whom peace is made. The word Islam, therefore, means peace, greeting, safety or salvation. Nevertheless, it does not imply, as is commonly supposed, absolute submission to God’s will, but means striving after righteousness (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:137-8).

The essence of the ethical principles involved and embodied in Islam, according to him, is summarized in the first six verses of the second chapter of the Qur’an (Al-Baqarah). And based on them he concludes that the principal bases of Islamic systems are: (1) belief in the unity, immateriality, power, mercy, and supreme love of the Creator, (2) charity and brotherhood among mankind, (3) subjugation of the passions, (4) the outpouring of a greatful heart to the Giver of all good, and (5) accountability for human actions in another existence (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:138).

According to him, appeal is made by Islam to the inner consciousness of man, or his intuitive reason alone (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:138) so that by which man is aware of elevating his humanity to fulfill his duty to God by way of his services to mankind (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:174).

It is obvious, therefore, that in Islam not only are there human and rational aspects but there is also belief or dogmatic aspect, although the latter is, according to Amīr ‘Alī, limited only to the unity of God or tauhīd. In this respect he explicitly asserts:

In Islam …; with the exception of the unity of God – the doctrine of Tauhīd, which was the foundation of Mohammed’s Church – there was no dogma upon which insistence was placed in any such form as to compel Reason to hold back it acceptance (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:423).

His Thought on God and Man

As to God, Amīr ‘Alī seems to accept completely the concept of God and His Unity as explained in the Qur’an and opposed anthropomorphism, anthroposophism as well anthropopathism. That is why, not only does he oppose Christian anthropomorphic God but also rejects Ash‘arite notion which tends to describe and reason about God in terms of human wisdom. He , furthermore, also rejects the monistic and pantheistic concepts of God and man convinced by some Sufi leaders.

Indeed, Amīr ‘Alī explicitly believes in God’s attributes but he does not explain whether they are His essential attributes (sifat al żātiyya) as recognized by the Mu‘tazilite or His non-essential attributes (sifat ghair al żātiyya) as convinced by the Ash‘arites. But from his analysis on God and man, it is obvious that Amīr ‘Alī tends to accept the Mu‘tazilite with its notion of free will of man (qadariyya), rather than the Ash‘arite committed to the fatalism (jabariyya).

In this respect Amīr ‘Alī said:
One of the remarkable characteristics of the Koran is the curious, and, at first sight, inconsistent, manner in which it combines the existence of a Divine Will, which not only orders all things, but which acts directly upon men and addresses itself to the springs of thought in them, with the assertion of a free agency in man and of the liberty of intellect. … But in the Koran the conception of human responsibility is strongly developed that the question naturally occurs to the mind, How can those two ideas be reconciled with each other? (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:403-4).

According to him, the key for understanding this mystery are beliefs in what he calls the “active ever-living Principle,” i.e. all powerful Will of God, and in “the progress of man” (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:404). In many verses of the Qur’an that Amīr ‘Alī quoted, there are words taqdīr or qadar which, according to him, most of them mean “law of nature.” He said:
The stars and planets heave each their appointed course; so has every other object in reason. The movements of the heavenly bodies, the phenomenon of nature, life and death, are all governed by law (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:405).

Meanwhile, some other verses that he also quoted, obviously indicate the Divine agency upon human will or “conditioned” upon human will. He said:
It is to the seeker for Divine help that God renders His help; it is on the searcher of his own heart, who purifies his soul from impure longings, that God bestows grace (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:405-6).

Amīr ‘Alī admits hat our belief in God springs from the very essence of Divine ordinance or, strictly speaking, Divine laws that regulate the movements of heavenly bodies. But the will of God is not an arbitrary one: it is an educating will, to be obeyed by the scholar in his walks of learning as by the devotee in his cell. That is why, the verses in which human responsibility and the freedom of human will are laid down in emphatic terms define and limit the conception of absolutism (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:406).

He, therefore, explicitly says:
Man, within the limited sphere of his existence, is absolute master of his conduct. He is responsible for his actions, and for the use or misuse of the powers with which he has been endowed. He may fall or rise, according to his “inclination.” There was supreme assistance for him who sought Divine help and guidance (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:407).

Acording to Amīr ‘Alī every human being has two inclinations, one prompting him to good and impelling him thereto, and the other prompting him to evil and thereto impelling him. In this case he quotes ‘Alī ibn Abī Tālib’s sayings in one of his sermons, collected by Sharīf Rizā in his Nahj al-Balāghah, as follows:

It is your conduct which will lead you to paradise or hell, as if you had been destined therefore. No man’s conduct is the outcome of fatality, nor is he borne along by an irresistible decree to heaven or hell; on the contrary, the ultimate result is the creation of his own actions, for each individual is primarily answerable for his future destiny (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:408)
Still in this respect, Amīr ‘Alī also quotes ‘Alī as saying:

Say not that man is compelled, for that it is attribution of tyranny to God; nor say that man has absolute discretion [i.e. to decide what is right and what is wrong – Ameer Alī’s note], grace is our endeavours to act righteously, and we transgress because of our neglect (of His commands) (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:410).

From the above analyses, it is clear that Amīr ‘Alī tends more to qadariyya rather that jabariyya, although in some cases he does not accept the notions of Mu‘tazilite, such as on the limitless power of reason.

His Thought on This-World and Other-world Lives

This-world life is, to Amīr ‘Alī, very significant, especially in relation to the actualization of religious teachings. Islam as a religion, in the words of Amīr ‘Alī, is not “a mere creed; it is a life to be believed in the present” – a religion of right-doing and right-thinking, founded on divine love, universal charity, and the equality of man in the sight of the Lord (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:178).
According to him, the present life is the seed-ground of the future one, in which every human being is responsible for all his deeds before God and by which he will be happy or unhappy in the hereafter (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:179; Harun Nasution, 1987:184).

Two beliefs that should be accepted by all Muslims, in relation to the other-world life, area; (1) every human being will have to render an account of his or her actions on earth, and (2) the happiness or misery of individuals will depend upon the manner in which they have performed the behests of their Creator. Anything else outside both beliefs, that are usually under disputes among Muslim thinkers, according to him, must not be accepted, including questions on what paradise and hell really are (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:197-8).

According to Amīr ‘Alī, the idea of happiness and unhappiness in the other-world life has something to do with this-world life, in that by which man is appealed to keep his morality and to perform good deeds. In other words, it might remind and even to make man aware of fulfilling his responsibilities (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:176).

He thinks that happiness and misery in the other-world life is spiritual although they are described concretely. According to him various chapters of the Qur’an containing the descriptions of paradise as well as hell were wholly or in part revealed in Mecca so that it must be in accordance with the religious consciousness at that time. Muhammad himself not only speaks with people of high intellectuality who can perceive abstract things, but also with the common world which was then sank in materialism. So he had to adapt himself to the understanding of all (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:198-9). In this respect he wrote:

Probably in the infancy of his religious consciousness, Mohamed himself believed in some or other of the traditions which floated around him. But with a wider awakening of the soul, a deeper communion with the Creator of the Universe, thoughts, which bore a material aspect at first, became spiritualized. The mind of the Teacher progressed not only with the march of time and the development of his religious consciousness, but also with the progress of his disciples in apprehending spiritual conceptions. Hence in the later suras we observe a merging of the material in the spiritual, of the body in the soul (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:200-1).

His above-mentioned thought has, indeed, something to do with what is called the beatific vision of the Almighty (ru’yat Allāh). But like his description of paradise and hell, in this case, he does not explain his opinion strictly, either. He only says:
Without venturing to pass any opinion on these different notions, we may take this occasion to state our own belief with regard to the Koranic conception of future rewards and punishments (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:200).

His Thought on Revelation and Reason

The last, but not least, important thing to know about Amīr ‘Alī is his opinion on the revelation, its nature as well as that on how the process of revelation itself really took place. Amīr ‘Alī interprets Muhammad’s prophetic experience in the cave of Hirā as an ecstatic mystical experience as that of Sufi leaders, after being deep in communion (al tahannuth) with the Almighty in the cave (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:16).

Amīr ‘Alī told the story of Muhammad’s solitude in the cave at full length, after he was annoyed to learn the life of his community which was far away from God’s guidance until he finally received revelation or what he called mental vision (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:16 ff.). By interpreting revelation as mental vision, which looks like self communion in God, leads Amīr ‘Alī to think that Muhammad’s experience of solitude is really the same as that or Jesus who ran away from his community while, at the same time, contemplating somewhere in the hope that there he would have heard the voice of the Almighty (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:16 ff.).

According to Anis Ahmad, he apparently fails to see that Jesus’ vision is his wilderness was of devil, while the Prophet saw Gabriel who brought with him the message sent by Allah. In addition, Anis Ahmad also thinks hat such a generalization is perhaps caused by the influence of tradition of West liberal philosophical thought upon Amīr ‘Alī, so that in many of his interpretations of Islam there are similarities as that of Western orientalists (Anis Ahmad, 1980:116-7)

He takes an example of Amīr ‘Alī’s interpretation of revelation as “the over-wrought mind” (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:16) which resembles the statement of orientalist Margoliouth in his introduction to J. M. Rodwell’s translation of the Qur’an, when he speaks about Muhammad’s psychology that "his chief objects of knowledge are floating stories and tradition largely picked up from hearsay, and his over-wrought mind in his only teacher" (Anis Ahmad, 1980:117).
It is his understanding of the nature of revelation that many people regard him as tending to think that Qur’anic teachings on legal, moral, economical, social as well as political spheres are created by Muhammad himself. And it is true that he is of the same opinion as that or Margoliouth in that the Prophet was considerably influenced by local Arabian folklores which are eventually included in his teachings (Anis Ahmad, 1980:117-8).

And thus conclusion is quite the same as Amīr ‘Alī’s own statement:
Mohamed, when promulgated his faith and his laws, found these traditions current among his people: he took them up and adopted them as the lever for raising the Arabs and surrounding nations (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:lxxi).

In addition to the above-mentioned, it is also interesting to know about his opinion on how the revelation should be interpreted. According to him, the present stagnation of the Muslim communities is principally due to the fact that the right of exercising private judgment (ijtihād) ceased with the ninth-century legists, and it is sinful to do such a judgment today. According to them, in order to become a good follower of orthodox Islam it is enough for him to follow one of the existing schools. Such a case is not only found in the Sunnite but also Shi‘ite wings. Amīr ‘Alī maintained that Muhammad himself gave a high position to human reason, but our schoolmen and their servile followers have made its exercise a sin and a crime (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:183-4).
According to Amīr ‘Alī, there is a necessity for Islamic reformation and, as that in Christianity, it must be initiated with enlightenment. And before there can be a renovation of religious life, the mind must first escape from the bondage of what he calls literal interpretation and the doctrine of “conformity.” (Ameer ‘Alī, 1978:183-4).

It is obvious, therefore, that, as any other modern Muslim thinkers, he claims for the right of ijtihād and to interpret Islam rationally. Not only does he oppose traditional thought in the Sunni wing but also in the Shi‘ite, to which he also belongs. Some more important things about him and his thought are of course very interesting to know. He is a great man with a great deal of ideas. And he is right to e one of our subjects to study further.***

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Ameer ‘Alī, Syed. 1951. A Short History of the Saracens. London: Macmillan and Co., Ltd., reprint, 1998.
––––– 1978. The Spirit of Islam: A History of the Evolution and Ideals of Islam with a Life of the Prophet. Delhi: Idarah-i-Adabiyat-i-Delli, reprint, 1922.
––––– 1981. Islamic History & Culture. Delhi: Amar Prakashan.
Ahmad, Anis. 1980. “Two Approaches to Islamic History: A Critique od Shibli Nu‘mani’s and Syed Ameer Alī’s Interpretations of History.” Unpublished Ph. D. Dissertation. Temple University, U.S.A.
Amīn, Ahmad. 1979. Zu‘amā’ al Islāh fī al ‘Asr al Hadīth. Qāhirah: Maktabah al Nahdah al Misriyyah.
Gibb, H. A. R. 1978. Modern Trends in Islam. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1947; reprint, New York: Octagon Books.
Harun Nasution. 1978. Pembaharuan dalam Islam: Sejarah Pemikiran dan Gerakan [Modernization in Islam: History of Thought and Movement]. Jakarta: Bulan Bintang, 5th printing.
Singh, Attar. 1976. Socio-Cultural Impact of Islam on India. Chandigarh: Publication Bureau, Panjab University, first edition.
Smith, Wilfred Cantwell. 1979. Modern Islam in India: A Social Analysis. New Delhi: Usha Publications, second revised edition. Reprint, 1946.
Voll, John Obert. 1982. Islam: Continuity and Change in the Modern World. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, Inc.

Teknik Penerjemahan dan Penyaduran Karya Ilmiah

TEKNIK PENERJEMAHAN DAN PENYADURAN
KARYA ILMIAH

Oleh Machnun Husein*

Dan di antara tanda-tanda [Kemahakuasaan]-Nya adalah penciptaan langit-langit dan bumi, keragaman bahasa dan warna kulitmu. Sesungguhnya dalam hal itu terdapat tanda-tanda [Kemahakuasaan Allah] bagi orang-orang yang berilmu. (QS. 30- Ar-Rūm: 30).

Pengantar

Arti pentingnya kegiatan penerjemahan untuk maksud dan tujuan apa pun sudah diakui di mana-mana dan oleh semua bangsa. Melalui karya-karya terjemahan orang bisa dengan mudah mendapatkan informasi dan tambahan ilmu pengetahuan dan teknologi, sehingga karenanya dia mampu mengembangkan wawasan keilmuannya. Sejarah mencatat bahwa kejayaan umat Muslim di masa pemerintahan khalifah ‘Abbasiyyah, Harun ar-Rasyid, diawali dengan kegiatan penerjemahan karya-karya ilmiah lama, khususnya dari bangsa Yunani.

Bangsa Indonesia pun sudah mengakui arti pentingnya kegiatan penerjemahan itu sejak masa-masa sebelum kemerdekaan. Hal itu antara lain terlihat dari banyaknya karya ilmiah dan sastra asing yang diterjemahkan ke dalam bahasa Indonesia walaupun, menurut pengamatan Harimurti Kridalaksana, terjemahan-terjemahan itu kurang memuaskan.[1]

Para ahli bahasa Indonesia melalui Kongres Bahasa Indonesia yang ke-2 di Medan pada tahun 1954, bahkan menyatakan perlu adanya Jawatan Penerjemah Negara dan Balai Penerjemah Sastra yang diberi perlengkapan personalia, peralatan dan keuangan yang cukup. Dan pernyataan itu diulang kembali dalam kongresnya yang ke-3 di Jakarta pada tahun 1978, yang antara lain menyatakan bahwa

untuk pengembangan ilmu pengetahuan dan cara berpikir ilmiah, buku-buku dan kepustakaan ilmiah yang ditulis dalam bahasa asing perlu disebarluaskan dengan jalan menerjemahkan ke dalam bahasa Indonesia dan untuk mencapai tujuan itu perlu dibentuk Badan Penerjemah Nasional dengan wewenang, dana, dan tenaga profesional yang cukup. Tugas Badan ini disamping menerjemahkan bahan-bahan ilmiah juga bertugas menerjemahkan dan menerbitkan karya sastra asli berbahasa daerah ke dalam bahasa Indonesia.[2]

Lebih jauh Kongres Bahasa Indonesia ke-4 di Jakarta pada tahun 1983, juga menyatakan bahwa bukan hanya buku-buku ilmiah dan sastra yang perlu dipergiat penulisan dan penerjemahannya ke dalam Bahasa Indonesia, tetapi juga semua buku yang bermanfaat dalam pelbagai bidang.[3]

Dan last but not least, Garis-garis Besar Haluan Negara (GBHN) tahun 1993 pun menyatakan:

Penulisan, penerjemahan, dan penggandaan buku pelajaran, buku bacaan, khususnya bacaan anak yang berisikan ceritera rakyat, buku ilmu pengetahuan dan teknologi, serta terbitan buku pendidikan lainnya digalakkan untuk membantu peningkatan kualitas pendidikan dan memperluas cakrawala berpikir serta menumbuhkan budaya baca. Jumlah dan kualitasnya perlu terus ditingkatkan serta disebarkan merata di seluruh tanah air dengan harga yang terjangkau oleh seluruh lapisan masyarakat. Bersamaan dengan itu dikembangkan iklim yang dapat mendorong penulisan dan penerjemahan buku dengan penghargaan yang memadai dan jaminan perlindungan hak cipta.[4]

Persoalannya sekarang, khususnya bagi kita para peserta Penataran Nasional tentang Seni dan Metode Tarjamah ini, adalah apa yang seharusnya kita lakukan untuk membuktikan kebenaran penilaian dan pernyataan kita itu. Saya yakin bahwa kalian datang ke sini tidak sekedar ingin mendapatkan informasi tentang arti penting dan “sedikit” teori atau metode penerjemahan, melainkan benar-benar ingin meningkatkan diri agar mampu melakukan kegiatan penerjemahan secara profesional.

Atas dasar itulah saya perlu menjelaskan bahwa makalah saya ini tidak banyak bicara tentang aspek-aspek teoretik dan metodik penerjemahan, melainkan lebih banyak berbicara tentang aspek-aspek praktisnya. Acuan pokok saya adalah pengamatan dan pengalaman selintas di lapangan, baik pengalaman pribadi maupun pengalaman orang lain. Karena itu, saya berharap agar para peserta penataran nasional ini menanggapinya secara praktis dan menindaklanjutinya dengan kegiatan praktis juga. Maksud saya, seusai penataran ini kalian diharapkan segera membuat rencana dan program penerjemahan, baik secara individual maupun secara berkelompok, kemudian mendorong para pimpinan lembaga-lembaga pendidikan tinggi di tempat kalian semua mengabdi, untuk mengambil langkah-langkah seperlunya sehingga karya-karya itu bisa diterbitkan dan disebarluaskan kepada masyarakat.

Dengan pertimbangan serupa di sini saya perlu menyampaikan juga bahwa judul “Kaifiyyāt Tadwīnut-Tarjamah” yang disodorkan kepada saya oleh Panitia Penyelenggara, terpaksa saya ubah menjadi “Teknik Penerjemahan dan Penyaduran Karya Ilmiah: Sebuah Tinjauan Praktis.”

Karya Ilmiah

Ada beberapa istilah teknis yang perlu dijelaskan terlebih dahulu sebelum kita berbicara lebih jauh. Yang pertama adalah istilah “karya ilmiah” (scientific work). Secara sederhana karya ilmiah dapat dirumuskan sebagai karya yang terkait dengan ilmu, baik berupa tulisan ataupun tuturan (orasi). Dengan demikian karya sastra tidak termasuk bahasan dalam makalah ini.

Karya ilmiah, dari satu sisi, dapat diklasifikasikan dalam dua kategori: Karya ilmiah asli dan karya ilmiah tidak asli. Karya ilmiah asli adalah karya ilmiah yang ditulis atau diucapkan oleh dan berisi gagasan-gagasan, data dan analisis dari atau yang diupayakan oleh penulisnya sendiri. Sedangkan karya ilmiah tidak asli adalah yang ditulis oleh seseorang tetapi isinya berasal dari orang atau penulis lain.

Karya ilmiah bisa ditulis oleh seorang penulis atau oleh beberapa orang penulis; yang pertama sering disebut karya individual sedangkan yang disebut belakangan dikenal sebagai karya bersama. Makalah, skripsi, laporan penelitian, tesis dan disertasi adalah contoh-contoh karya ilmiah asli, sedangkan terjemahan, rangkuman (kompilasi) dan saduran adalah contoh-contoh karya ilmiah tidak asli.

Salah satu perbedaan mencolok antara karya ilmiah asli dan tidak asli terletak pada tanggungjawab ilmiah para penulisnya. Pada karya ilmiah asli, penulis bertanggungjawab penuh atas kebenaran isi maupun kesimpulannya, sedangkan pada karya ilmiah tidak asli penulis hanya bertanggungjawab atas kebenaran dan ketepatan dalam penyajian kembali gagasan-gagasan, analisis serta kesimpulan yang dikemukakan oleh penulis aslinya. Oleh karena itu berbeda dengan karya ilmiah asli, dalam karya ilmiah tidak asli penerjemah atau penyadurnya tidak berhak menampilkan namanya secara mencolok atau menyatakan dirinya sebagai penulis; dia hanya berhak menyebut dirinya sebagai penerjemah atau penyadur saja, dan nama penulis aslinya wajib dicantumkan secara jelas, baik di sampul maupun di halaman dalamnya.

Bila ada resensor atau reviewer mengeritik karya terjemahan atau saduran, penerjemah atau penyadur tidak berkewajiban menanggapinya bila kritik itu ditujukan pada data, analisis dan kesimpulan yang merupakan substansi buku terjemahan atau saduran yang bersangkutan. Sesuai dengan kedudukannya sebagai penerjemah atau penyadur dia hanya berkewajiban menanggapi kritik-kritik atau saran-saran yang berkaitan dengan penerjemahan dan penyadurannya saja. Namun di mana perlu dia dibenarkan untuk memberikan penjelasan atau ilustrasi terhadap bagian isi yang dikritik tersebut, baik yang bernada setuju atau menentang penulis aslinya. Dengan perkataan lain, tidak ada keharusan bagi penerjemah atau penyadur untuk sependapat dengan atau menerima gagasan-gagasan, data, analisis maupun kesimpulan penulis aslinya itu.

Sikap penerjemah, perangkum dan penyadur tersebut bisa secara langsung dikemukakan dalam karyanya tersebut, baik dalam bentuk Kata Pengantar, Anotasi maupun Bab Tambahan. Sebagai konsekuensinya, setiap penerjemah, perangkum atau penyadur tidak hanya dituntut untuk menguasai bahasanya (dalam hal ini bahasa buku aslinya dan sekaligus Bahasa Indonesianya), tetapi juga substansi yang dibahas dalam karya ilmiah aslinya itu.
Bahasa Ibu, Bahasa Kedua dan Bahasa Asing

Bahasa dalam Ilmu Bahasa (Linguistik) dibedakan menjadi tiga macam: bahasa ibu (mother tongue), bahasa kedua (second language) dan bahasa asing (foreign language). Bahasa ibu adalah bahasa yang digunakan orang dalam segala aspek hidup kesehariannya, misalnya bahasa Jawa bagi orang Jawa, bahasa Sunda bagi orang Sunda, bahasa Sasak bagi orang Lombok, dan sebagainya. Bahasa kedua adalah bahasa yang digunakan orang dalam hidup kesehariannya disamping bahasa ibunya, misalnya bahasa Inggris bagi sebagian besar masyarakat negara-negara bekas jajahan Inggris. Sedangkan bahasa asing adalah bahasa yang tidak digunakan orang dalam hidup kesehariannya, tetapi diperlukan untuk membantu pekerjaan atau profesinya. Sebagai contoh, bahasa Arab dan Inggris adalah bahasa-bahasa asing bagi bangsa Indonesia yang bekerja sebagai dosen-dosen studi Islam.

Perbedaan status bahasa ini selain mengharuskan adanya variasi dan diversifikasi teknik dan metode pengajarannya juga, sampai batas tertentu, mengakibatkan semakin besar atau kecilnya minat orang untuk mempelajari dan menguasai bahasa-bahasa yang bersangkutan.

Para sarjana Indonesia dalam bidang studi Islam pada umumnya kurang begitu menguasai bahasa-bahasa asing, baik bahasa-bahasa Barat maupun bahasa-bahasa Timur, padahal banyak buku tentang Islam ditulis dalam berbagai macam bahasa. Karena itulah, mendiang Prof. Fazlur Rahman pernah melontarkan kritiknya bahwa, dalam pembahasan-pembahasan umum tentang Islam, Indonesia sangat diabaikan karena ada kesan bahwa Indonesia berada “di luar arus pemikiran intelektual,” dan tidak ada karya yang menyeluruh atau sekedar memadai tentang Islam dalam bahasa Barat.[5]

Makalah ini tidak akan membahas masalah variasi dan diversifikasi teknik dan metode pengajaran bahasa, dan juga tidak akan menanggapi kritik Fazlur Rahman itu, melainkan hanya akan membahas teknik penerjemahan dan penyaduran karya tulis ilmiah berbahasa asing, khususnya mengenai kajian Islam dan disiplin-disiplin yang dikembangkan di IAIN dan Perguruan-perguruan Tinggi Agama Islam Swasta (PTAIS), kedalam bahasa Indonesia. Dan bahasa asing yang dimaksud adalah bahasa-bahasa Arab dan Inggris.
Makna Penerjemahan dan Penyaduran

Dilihat dari segi kebahasaan, kata “penerjemahan” berasal dari kata Arab tarjamah (kata benda) atau tarjama (kata kerja), dan padanannya dalam bahasa Inggris adalah translation (kata benda) yang berasal dari kata kerja translate. Majdī Wahbah dan Kāmil al-Muhandis menerjemahkan kata tarjamah atau translation itu dengan
“menuliskan kembali pokok bahasan tertentu dalam bahasa selain bahasa aslinya.”[6]

Sementara itu kamus Munjid memberikan makna kata kerja tarjama [al-kalāma] dengan “menafsirkannya dengan bahasa lain atau mengutipnya ke bahasa lain.”[7] Selain itu kata tarjama juga berarti menceriterakan kisah. Karena itu kalimat Tarjama [ar-rajula] berarti żakara sīratah, dan kata tarjamah berarti Żikru syahsin wa akhlāqihī wa nasabihi atau biografi.[8]

Dalam pengertian tersebut terakhir ini terdapat frasa-frasa at-tarjamatuż-żātiyyah (autobiography), at-tarjamatuż-żātiyyah al-adabiyyah (literary autobiography), at-tarjamatul-qasasiyyah (romance biography) dan sebagainya.[9]

Sementara itu A. S. Hornby, E. V. Gatenby dan H. Wakefield dalam kamusnya memberikan tiga macam makna kata kerja translate sebagai berikut:

1. give the meaning of something said or written in another language.
2. interpret, clarify (somebody’s behaviour, etc.).
3. remove (the bishop) to a different see.[10]

Sedangkan Roget’s Thesaurus menyebutkan kata kerja eccleciasticize sebagai padanan kata kerja translate, kata transference dan transliteration sebagai padanan kata benda translation dan kata interpreter sebagai padanan kata translator.[11]

Dari uraian tersebut di atas dapat ditarik kesimpulan bahwa menerjemahkan bisa berarti:
1. mengalihbahasakan (termasuk alih huruf atau transliterasinya) sesuatu yang dikatakan atau ditulis dalam bahasa tertentu ke dalam bahasa lain.
2. menafsirkan, atau menjelaskan (sesuatu yang kurang atau tidak jelas)
3. menceriterakan sesuatu, dan
4. memindahkan penjabat agama (uskup) dari wilayah keuskupan tertentu ke wilayah keuskupan lainnya.

Di antara keempat arti tersebut, dua yang disebut pertama memiliki relevansi tinggi dengan pokok bahasan sekarang. Karena itu dua arti itulah yang untuk selanjutnya dipergunakan dalam makalah ini.

Dilihat dari cara penerjemahannya, terjemahan bisa dibedakan menjadi dua macam: terjemahan harfiah (at-tarjamatul-harfiyyah, loan transition atau word-for-word translation).[12] Terjemahan harfiah adalah terjemahan dari satu bahasa ke bahasa lain dengan tidak mengubah bentuk, pola dan susunan katanya serta pola kalimatnya. Contoh terjemahan harfiah adalah Al-Qur’än dan Terjemahnya, terjemahan tim Departemen Agama. Sedangkan terjemahan bebas adalah terjemahan yang hanya terikat dengan makna aslinya tetapi tidak terikat baik dengan bentuk dan susunan katanya maupun dengan pola kalimatnya.[13] Karena itu terjemahan bebas sering dikenal juga dengan sebutan tarjamah ma‘nawiyyah. Contoh terjemahan bebas adalah Al-Qur’ān Bacaan Mulia, terjemahan H. B. Jassin.

Terjemahan harfiah, walaupun sering dianggap sangat bermanfaat untuk mempertahankan keaslian karya yang diterjemahkan, dalam kenyataannya tidak selamanya benar dan bahkan, dalam banyak hal, tidak hanya membingungkan pembacanya tetapi juga merusak bahasa terjemahannya. Hal ini, sebagaimana akan dijelaskan lebih lanjut, disebabkan oleh kenyataan bahwa terjemahan harfiah cenderung memaksakan pola bahasa asing ke dalam bahasa terjemahan. Karena pada dasarnya setiap bahasa merupakan sistem dengan sub-sub sistemnya yang sering berbeda-beda antara satu bahasa dengan bahasa lainnya, maka setiap penerjemah dan penyadur seharusnya menguasai, minimal, dua bahasa sekaligus: bahasa sumber yang diterjemahkan [dalam hal ini bahasa Arab dan Inggris] dan bahasa reseptor atau bahasa terjemahannya, yaitu bahasa Indonesia. Penguasaan yang tidak sempurna terhadap salah satu di antara bahasa-bahasa tersebut cenderung menimbulkan kesalahan dalam penerjemahan atau penyaduran yang dilakukannya.

Memang penerjemah dituntut untuk mengalihkan baik isi maupun bentuk bahasa sumber ke dalam bahasa reseptornya, tetapi pekerjaan ini jelas sangat sulit, kalau tidak bisa disebut sama sekali tidak mungkin. Perlu dijelaskan bahwa, bagaimanapun juga, terjemahan tidak akan sama persis dengan aslinya baik dalam makna maupun gaya bahasanya. Karena itu target minimal yang seharusnya dicapai oleh setiap penerjemah adalah pengalihan makna dan gaya yang paling mirip dengan aslinya itu.[14] Bila suatu terjemahan secara keseluruhan tidak mengikuti atau tidak sesuai dengan gaya bahasa aslinya, maka terjemahan semacam itulah yang dikenal sebagai saduran.

Analisis Kontrastif atau Analisis Perbandingan

Salah satu teknik yang terbaik untuk diterapkan dalam penerjemahan dan penyaduran adalah apa yang dikenal dengan analisis kontrastif (contrastive analysis), yaitu "a scientific description of the language to be learned [or translated] carefully compared with a parallel description of the native language of the learner [translator]."[15]

Kemampuan untuk memperbandingkan dan menganalisis aspek-aspek kebahasaan dari kedua bahasa tersebut perlu dimiliki oleh setiap penerjemah, perangkum maupun penyadur. Dengan kemampuan ini dia akan mampu menentukan secara cepat dan tepat apakah suatu pernyataan dalam bahasa Arab atau Inggris harus diterjemahkan secara harfiah ataukah secara bebas dengan pola yang sama sekali berbeda.

Dalam analisis kontrastif ini, sekurang-kurangnya ada tiga hal pokok yang perlu diperbandingkan dan dianalisis, yaitu: (1) aspek tata-bunyi atau fonologiknya, (2) aspek gramatikanya, dan (3) aspek kosa kata atau leksikalnya.

Analisis Perbandingan Fonologik

Para ahli bahasa menyatakan bahwa bahsa itu sebenarnya adalah ucapan; ia merupakan sistem [tata] bunyi yang terkait dengan sistem [tata] makna. Dengan demikian perbedaan dalam pengucapan – bunyi, tekanan, intonasi dan panjang pendeknya – akan mengakibatkan perubahan makna. Walaupun sampai batas tertentu, kemampuan untuk memperbandingkan sistem tata bunyi bahasa Arab dan Inggris, di satu pihak, dan bahasa Indonesia, di pihak lain, kurang begitu penting bagi penerjemah dan penyadur karya tulis, namun pada suatu saat kemampuan ini akan terasa sangat perlu terutama bila dia harus mengikuti ceramah, kuliah, berdiskusi atau berwawancara dengan penulisnya yang akan diterjemahkan atau disadurnya.

Masalah penting lainnya yang terkait dengan analisis fonologik ini adalah masalah alih huruf (transliterasi), khususnya untuk bunyi-bunyi bahasa Arab dalam bahasa Inggris atau bahasa Indonesia. Seperti diketahui, kata-kata yang sama dalam bahasa Arab, baik yang berkaitan dengan nama diri maupun dengan istilah-istilah teknis, bisa ditulis berbeda dalam bahasa Inggris atau Indonesia karena sistem transliterasi dalam kedua bahasa tersebut berbeda satu sama lain. Nama khalifah ketiga, ‘Usman, misalnya, biasa ditulis ‘Uthmān dalam bahasa Inggris dan ‘Uśmān dalam bahasa Indonesia. Untuk dapat menuliskan kata-kata atau bunyi-bunyi secara tepat, setiap penerjemah dan penyadur jelas memerlukan pengetahuan dan kemampuan memperbandingkan sistem-sistem transliterasi yang berlaku pada setiap bahasa, termasuk sistem transliterasi Arab-Inggris dan Arab-Indonesia.[16]

Analisis Perbandingan Gramatikal

Perlu dikemukakan bahwa anara bahasa Arab dan Inggris, di satu pihak, dan bahasa Indonesia, di pihak lain, terdapat tidak sedikit perbedaan disamping kesamaan-kesamaannya, dalam aspek gramatikanya. Persoalan dan kesulitan biasanya timbul dalam hal-hal yang berbeda, bukan dalam hal-hal yang sama.[17] Untuk mengatasi persoalan dan kesulitan itu, setiap penerjemah, perangkum dan penyadur perlu mengetahui dan menganalisis perbedaan-perbedaan tersebut sehingga dia dapat mengungkapkannya kembali sesuai dengan kaidah-kaidah kebahasaan Indonesia tanpa mengubah maknanya.

Di antara perbedaan-perbedaan penting yang problematik antara bahasa Arab dan bahasa Inggris, di satu pihak, dan bahasa Indonesia, di pihak lain, dalam aspek ini adalah sebagai berikut:
1. Perubahan bentuk kata kerja karena perbedaan waktu.
2. Perubahan bentuk kata kerja karena perbedaan subjek.
3. Perubahan bentuk kata benda karena perbedaan kuantitas (mufrad, muśanna, atau jama’).
4. Perubahan bentuk kata karena perubahan part of speech (anwā‘ul-bina’)
5. Perubahan bentuk kata kerja, kata benda atau kata ganti karena perubahan fungsi dalam kalimat.
6. Perubahan urutan kata karena perbedaan pola kata dan, last but not least,
7. Perubahan urutan kata karena perbedaan pola frasa atau pola kalimat.

Mengenai perubahan bentuk kata dalam bahasa Arab dan bahasa Inggris sebagaimana disebut pada butir-butir 1, 2, dan 5 boleh dikatakan tidak menimbulkan kesulitan apa-apa karena dalam bahasa Indonesia pada dasarnya tidak dikenal perubahan-perubahan bentuk kata semacam itu. Perubahan-perubahan bentuk kata karena perbedaan kuantitas atau part of speech (anwā‘ul-binā’) pada butir-butir 3 dan 4, juga dapat diatasi dengan mudah. Pembentukan kata benda jamak dalam bahasa Indonesia cukup dengan mengulang kata benda mufradnya, selama tidak ada quantifier di depannya, atau dengan membubuhkan kata para di depan kata benda mufrad yang bersangkutan. Penbentukan kata benda dapat dilakukan dengan awalan pe atau ke dan akhiran an, sedangkan pembentukan kata keterangan dapat dilakukan dengan membubuhkan kata secara atau dengan di depan kata sifat.

Satu hal yang perlu mendapatkan perhatian dalam kaitan ini adalah mengenai penyerapan kata-kata Arab dan Inggris ke dalam bahasa Indonesia, seperti ‘ādil menjadi adil, salāmah menjadi selamat, ridā menjadi rela, active menjadi aktif, academic menjadi akademik, activity menjadi aktivitas dan sebagainya. Perlu diketahui bahwa kata-kata Arab dan Inggris tersebut di atas adalah sebagian di antara kata-kata yang sudah diserap menjadi bahasa Indonesia. Berdasarkan kaidah kebahasaan Indonesia, khususnya menurut Pedoman Umum Ejaan Yang Disempurnakan (EYD) dan Pedoman Umum Pembentukan Istilah (PUPI), kata-kata serapan ditulis (ditranskripsikan) sesuai dengan ejaan dan sistem tata-bunyi bahasa Indonesia.

Khusus mengenai kata-kata serapan dari bahasa-bahasa Barat, terdapat kecenderungan untuk mengadaptasi pola Inggris. Namun untuk beberapa kata serapan tertentu, ternyata pola itu tidak dapat diterapkan; karena itu untuk beberapa kata pola Belanda masih dipergunakan, misalnya kata-kata Inggris practical dan economical tidak diserap menjadi praktik dan ekonomik, melainkan praktis dan ekonomis.

Hal lain yang perlu diperhatikan adalah mengenai transkripsi dan transliterasi kata-kata Arab yang diserap ke dalam bahasa Inggris atau sebaliknya, khususnya yang tidak begitu dikenal di Indonesia atau yang berbeda dengan kata serapan dalam bahasa Indonesia. Nama-nama Arab seperti Muhammad, Ibnu Sīnā, Ibnu Rusyd ditranskripsikan dalam bahasa Inggris menjadi Mohamed, Avicenna dan Averoes. Demikian juga dengan nama-nama tempat seperti Makkah, Madīnah, dan Misr, ditulis Mecca, Medina dan Egypt. Persoalannya adalah apakah kata-kata Arab yang ditulis dalam bahasa Inggris dengan Sistem Ejaan dan Transliterasi Arab-Inggris itu harus ditulis apa adanya, sesuai dengan teks Inggrisnya, ataukah harus disesaikan dengan Sistem Ejaan dan Transliterasi Arab-Indonesia.

Saya berpendapat, kata-kata Arab yang diserap ke dalam bahasa Inggris itu sebaiknya dikembalikan kepada keasliannya [dalam bahasa Arab], dan demikian juga kata-kata Inggris yang sudah diserap ke dalam bahasa Arab. Karena itu kata-kata semacam Mohamed, Avicenna dan Averoes kita transkripsikan dalam bahasa Indonesia menjadi Muhammad, Ibnu Sīnā dan Ibnu Rusyd.

Namun untuk ini ada baiknya juga bagi setiap penerjemah, perangkum dan penyadur untuk memperhatikan dan mengacu baik Pedoman Ejaan Yang Disempurnakan (EYD), Pedoman Umum Pembentukan Istilah (PUPI), kedua-duanya tahun 1975, dan Sistem Transliterasi Arab-Indonesia tahun 1988. Selain itu beberapa Pedoman Ejaan Bahasa-bahasa Daerah yang dikeluarkan oleh Pemerintah (cq. Departemen P & K) sejak tahun 1976 juga perlu diperhatikan dan diacu pula dalam karya-karya tulis berbahasa Arab atau Inggris yang bersangkutan bila di dalamnya terdapat kata-kata bahasa daerah tersebut.[18]

Perubahan urutan kata karena perbedaan pola kata, frasa atau pun pola kalimat merupakan bagian paling sulit dalam perbandingan gramatikal ini. Hal ini terjadi karena dalam hal ini terdapat banyak sekali perbedaan antara bahasa-bahasa Arab, Inggris dan Indonesia. Penguasaan yang kurang baik terhadap pola-pola kata, frasa dan kalimat dalam bahasa Indonesia akan menyebabkan terjadinya pemaksaan pola bahasa Inggris atau Arab ke dalam bahasa Indonesia atau akan merusak keindahan gaya bahasanya. Sekedar ilustrasi di bawah ini diberikan contoh.

The greatest danger of liberal education is the creation of a bewildering variety of ideas and thoughts. As a critic of liberal education has recently said, ‘There is no certain way to guarantee the survival of the past values.’ Dr. Rothblatt in his historical analysis of liberal education, Tradition and Change in English Liberal Education, concludes that ‘continual metamorphosis’ of the production of various ‘philosophical schema’ have practically destroyed the historical relationship between ‘society, education and self’.[19]

Frasa-frasa yang dicetak tebal tidak dapat diterjemahkan dengan urutan kata yang sama seperti aslinya, sedangkan frasa-frasa yang dicetak miring tidak dapat diterjemahkan dengan pola kalimat aktif sebagaimana aslinya, melainkan harus dipasifkan. Karenanya terjemahannya menjadi sebagai berikut:
The greatest danger of liberal education …
a. Bahaya pendidikan liberal yang terbesar … atau
b. Bahaya terbesar pendidikan liberal …
a bewildering variety of ideas and thoughts.
Bermacam-macam gagasan dan pemikiran yang membingungkan.
have practically destroyed the historical relationship
a. praktis telah menghancurkan hubungan historik … atau
b. secara praktis telah menghancurkan hubungan historik …
As a critic of liberal education has recently said
a. Sebagaimana (sudah) dikatakan belum lama ini oleh seorang kritikus terhadap ‘pendidikan liberal’ … atau
b. Seperti dikatakan oleh seorang pengeritik ‘pendidikan liberal’ belum lama ini

Bahkan lebih dari itu, pola kalimat tertentu dalam bahasa Arab atau Inggris kadang-kadang harus dialihkan dalam pola yang sama sekali berbeda dalam bahasa Indonesia. Misalnya, pertanyaan: Do you smoke? Harus diterjemahkan dengan kalimat permohonan, Silakan merokok, dalam bahasa Indonesia. Demikian juga kalimat Why don’t you suscribe to Harian Tempo today, harus diterjemahkan dengan Silakan berlangganan Harian Tempo hari ini.

Masih dalam kaitan analisis gramatikal ini, kadang-kadang setiap penerjemah atau penyadur perlu memotong-motong kalimat yang dianggap terlalu panjang menjadi beberapa kalimat yang lebih pendek. Untuk ini dia harus mampu melakukan apa yang disebut analisis kalimat (sentence analysis), sehingga dalam pemotongannya itu tidak mengubah baik makna maupun fungsi setiap kata dalam konteks kalimat aslinya. Sekedar ilustrasi dikemukakan contoh sebagai berikut:

Within the tribe, the two most important families are those of Hashim and Umayya; their rivalries for the succession of the Prophet fill the first century and a half of Muslim history, and the immediately pre-Islamic history of Mecca is similarly filled with a contest betweem them as to the guardianship of the Ka‘ba and the care of the pilgrims to that sanctuary.[20]

Kalimat yang panjang ini dapat dipotong-potong menjadi empat kalimat sebagai berikut:

1. Within the tribe, the two most important families are of Hashim and Umayya.
2. Their rivalries for the succession of the Prophet fill the first century and a half of Muslim history.
3. The immediately pre-Islamic history of Mecca is similarly filled with a contest between them.
4. Their contest is as to the guardianship of the Ka‘ba and the care of the pilgrims to that sanctuary.

Pemotongan kalimat semacam itu selain memudahkan dalam penerjemahannya juga memudahkan dalam pemahamannya.

Analisis Perbandingan Leksikal

Berbeda dengan analisis perbandingan gramatikal, analisis perbandingan leksikal jauh lebih sulit, bahkan menurut Lim Kiat Boey paling sulit.[21] Hal ini disebabkan oleh kenyataan bahwa kosakata Arab dan Inggris tidak selamanya bisa diterjemahkan menurut makna denotatifnya, tetapi kadang-kadang harus diterjemahkan menurut makna konotatifnya yang bersifat idiomatik; sehingga pengetahuan tentang latar belakang psikososiokultural penutur bahasa Arab dan Inggris tersebut perlu dimiliki oleh setiap penerjemah dan penyadur karya tulis dalam dua bahasa tersebut. Selain itu, kata-kata tertentu dalam bahasa Arab atau pun Inggris kadang-kadang, bahkan sering, mempunyai makna lebih dari satu sehingga pemilihan makna yang tepat sesuai dengan konteks merupakan sesuatu yang perlu mendapatkan perhatian.

Untuk ini setiap penerjemah dan penyadur dianjurkan untuk, setidak-tidaknya, memiliki kamus-kamus yang besar dan lengkap, seperti Lisānul-‘Arab dan Qāmūs al-Muhīt untuk bahasa Arab dan Webster dan Roget’s Thesaurus untuk bahasa Inggris, serta kamus-kamus idiom. Kamus Arab-Inggris dan Inggris-Arab juga diperlukan, terutama, untuk penerjemahan dan penyaduran karya-karya ilmiah mengenai studi Islam.

Erat kaitannya dengan ini adalah penerjemahan istilah-istilah teknis dalam bahasa Inggris yang berasal dari bahasa-bahasa lain, terutama Arab, semacam stations dalam kajian Tasawuf yang semakna dengan maqāmāt dalam bahasa Arab, Islamic Canon Law dalam kajian Syari‘ah yang semakna dengan Al-Fiqhul-Islāmi dalam bahasa Arab, prophetic tradition yang semakna dengan Hadīs Nabawī, dan sebagainya.

Untuk ini setiap penerjemah dan penyadur hendaknya mengacu, lebih baik lagi memiliki, kamus-kamus khusus seperti Dictionary of Islam (Thomas Patrick Hughes, 1885), Shorter Encyclopædia of Islam (H.A.R. Gibb dan H. Kramers, 1974), Dictionary of Non-Christian Religions (Parrinder, 1976), A Dictionary of Comparative Religion (S.G.F. Brandon, 1970), A Dictionary of Muslim Philosophy (M. Saeed Sheikh, 1970), dan sebagainya.

Kesulitan baru kadang-kadang timbul bila para penulis mempergunakan istilah yang berbeda dalam bahasa Inggris untuk istilah-istilah yang sama dalam bahasa Arab, seperti istilah fatalism yang oleh penulis tertentu dipergunakan sebagai pengganti istilah jabariyyah tetapi oleh penulis lain diartikan sebagai tawakkal, atau istilah maqāmāt dalam Tasawuf Islam yang diinggriskan menjadi stages atau stations; dan masih banyak lagi yang lainnya. Hal ini tidak saja terjadi pada karya-karya tulis para orientalis, tetapi juga pada beberapa karya tulis para pakar Muslim sendiri. Untuk yang disebut belakangan ini dapat dikemukakan karya Sayyid Amir ‘Ali, The Spirit of Islam. Dalam buku tersebut dia mempergunakan, misalnya, kata master, bukan prophet, untuk nabi, dan church untuk agama.

Kesulitan ini sudah barang tentu tidak dapat diatasi oleh penerjemah dan penyadur yang tidak memahami atau menguasai bidang studi Islam, meskipun penguasaanya terhadap bahasa-bahasa Inggris dan Indonesianya relatif sangat baik. Itulah sebabnya, seperti sudah dikemukakan sebelumnya, setiap penerjemah dan penyadur harus menguasai substansi yang dibahas dalam buku yang akan diterjemahkan atau disadurnya sebab, bila tidak, terjemahan atau sadurannya akan cenderung banyak kesalahannya. Dengan perkataan lain, setiap penerjemah dan penyadur harus terlebih dahulu bertanya kepada dirinya sendiri, “Apakah saya mampu memahami substansi yang dibahas dalam buku yang akan saya terjemahkan atau sadur ini?” Bila dia tidak mampu memahami atau hanya memahami sebagian saja, sebaiknya dia mengurungkan saja niatnya dan mencari buku lain yang jelas cocok dengan bidangnya. Hal ini perlu diperhatikan karena terjemahan yang tidak benar tidak hanya akan menyesatkan pembacanya tetapi juga, yang lebih fatal, akan sekaligus menjatuhkan reputasi keilmuan penulis aslinya. Dengan perkataan lain intellectual honesty atau kejujuran intelektual perlu dimiliki oleh setiap penerjemah dan penyadur.

Terjemahan Beranotasi

Di atas sudah dikemukakan bahwa terjemahan bisa dibedakan menjadi terjemahan harfiah dan terjemahan bebas. Dari sisi lain terjemahan juga bisa dibedakan dalam terjemahan apa adanya (original/pure translation) dan terjemahan beranotasi (annotated translation). Terjemahan apa adanya adalah terjemahan yang ditulis sedemikian rupa sehingga tidak ada tambahan atau keterangan sedikit pun dari penerjemahnya, baik sebagai kata pengantar di halaman-halaman awal maupun keterangan-keterangan di halaman dalamnya. Semua nama dan istilah asing yang dipergunakan oleh penulis aslinya ditampilkan begitu saja tanpa keterangan apapun. Gagasan-gagasan dan kesimpulan-kesimpulan yang dikemukakan dan bahkan kesalahan cetak yang dilakukan oleh penulis aslinya juga tidak dikoreksi atau dibetulkan oleh penerjemah atau penyadurnya. Pendek kata terjemahan apa adanya merupakan terjemahan yang “persis sama” dengan aslinya.

Terjemahan semacam ini biasanya tidak menarik dan juga tidak membantu para pembaca pemula, yang belum pernah atau baru mulai mempelajari substansi yang dibahas dalam buku tersebut. Dan, dari sisi lain, buku terjemahan semacam itu kurang laku di pasaran.

Hal ini berbeda dengan terjemahan beranotasi. Dalam terjemahan ini nama-nama yang dianggap asing dan istilah-istilah penting yang tidak dijelaskan oleh penulis aslinya diberi keterangan atau catatan oleh penerjemahnya baik secara langsung dibubuhkan dalam teks maupun sebagai catatan kaki pada halaman yang bersangkutan atau catatan akhir di akhir bab yang bersangkutan. Anotasi yang relatif pendek biasanya dibubuhkan langsung dalam teks dan ditempatkan di antara tanda kurung siku [ ], sedangkan yang panjang dibubuhkan sebagai catatan kaki (footnote) atau catatan akhir (endnote) dan di belakangnya dibubuhi inisial nama penerjemah atau penyadurnya.

Anotasi ini bisa bersifat eksplanatif atau ilustratif (menjelaskan), responsif (menanggapi) atau korektif (membetulkan). Terjemahan beranotasi ini biasanya lebih sulit dikerjakan, terutama bila penerjemahnya kurang memahami substansi yang dibahas, tidak mau mencari konsultan ahli, dan kurang banyak mempelajari buku-buku acuan yang relevan dengan substansi tersebut.

Satu hal lagi yang perlu dikemukakan dalam hal ini adalah anotasi terhadap judul buku atau jurnal. Pada dasarnya judul buku atau jurnal tidak perlu diterjemahkan. Sekedar contoh bisa dilihat kembali kutipan di muka yang berbunyi sebagai berikut:

Dr. Rothblatt in his historical analysys of liberal education, Tradition and Change in English Liberal Education, concludes that the ‘continual metamorphosis’ of the production of various ‘philosophical schema’ have practically destroyed the historical relationship between ‘society, education and self’.[22]

Judul buku Tradition and Change in English Liberal Education dalam kutipan di atas tidak perlu diterjemahkan ke dalam bahasa Indonesia. Namun bila penerjemah ingin memberitahu pembacanya makna judul buku tersebut, dia dapat membubuhkan terjemahannya dalam bahasa Indonesia dengan huruf tegak dan ditempatkan di antara dua tanda kurung siku, sehingga terjemahannya berbunyi:

Dr. Rothblatt dalam analisis historiknya terhadap pendidikan liberal, [dalam bukunya] Tradition and Change in English Liberal Education [Tradisi dan Perubahan dalam Pendidikan Liberal di Inggris] …

Sebaliknya bila buku tersebut diketahui telah diterjemahkan ke dalam bahasa Indonesia, maka lebih baik bila anotasinya ditempatkan sebagai catatan kaki atau catatan akhir, misalnya:

*Buku ini sudah diterjemahkan ke dalam bahasa Indonesia oleh Drs. Imran berjudul Tradisi dan Perubahan dalam Pendidikan Liberal di Inggris (Surakarta: UMS Press, Oktober 1994). [MH]

Kesimpulan dan Penutup

Dari uraian tersebut di atas kiranya dapat ditarik beberapa kesimpulan sebagai berikut:

1. Terjemahan, rangkuman dan saduran termasuk karya ilmiah tidak asli, karena itu penulisnya tidak berhak mencantumkan namanya secara mencolok atau menyatakan dirinya sebagai penulis, dan nama penulis aslinya harus disebut secara mencolok baik di sampul maupun di halaman dalamnya.
2. Penerjemah, perangkum dan penyadur hanya bertanggungjawab atas kebenaran dan ketepatan terjemahan, rangkuman dan sadurannya saja, bukan kebenaran data, analisis serta kesimpulannya.
3. Penerjemahan dan penyaduran karya tulis ilmiah berbahasa Arab dan Inggris bukanlah pekerjaan mudah. Setiap penerjemah dan penyadur selain dituntut untuk menguasai kedua bahasa asing tersebut dan bahasa Indonesia juga dituntut untuk memahami substansi yang dibahas dalam karya aslinya.
4. Karya terjemahan dan saduran, bagaimanapun juga, tidak dapat menyamai karya aslinya baik dalam makna maupun gayanya. Karena itu target minimal yang harus dicapai hanyalah penampilan kembali makna dan gaya bahasa yang paling mirip atau mendekati makna dan gaya bahasa karya aslinya.
5. Cara terbaik untuk diterapkan dalam penerjemahan dan penyaduran karya ilmiah berbahasa asing, khususnya Arab dan Inggris, adalah analisis kontrastif atau perbandingan antara bahasa asing yang bersangkutan dengan bahasa Indonesia terutama mengenai tiga aspek: (1) fonologik, (2) gramatikal, dan (3) leksikal.
6. Terjemahan, pada satu sisi, bisa dibedakan menjadi terjemahan harfiah dan terjemahan bebas atau terjemahan ma‘nawiyyah dan, di sisi lain, bisa dibedakan menjadi terjemahan apa adanya dan terjemahan beranotasi.

Demikianlah beberapa kesimpulan yang dapat ditarik dari uraian ini. Semoga ada manfaatnya. Dan sebagai penutup, marilah kita renungkan kembali makna firman Allah dalam Surat 30 (Ar-Rūm): 22, yang saya bacakan di awal uraian ini:

“Dan di antara tanda-tanda [Kemahakuasaan]-Nya adalah penciptaan langit-langit dan bumi, keragaman bahasa dan warna kulitmu. Sesungguhnya dalam hal itu terdapat tanda-tanda [Kemahakuasaan Allah] bagi orang-orang yang berilmu.”***

DAFTAR BACAAN:

Boey, Lim Kiat. An Introduction to Linguistics for the Language Teacher (Singapore: Singapore University Press, 1975).
Hornby, A. S., E. V. Gatenby dan H. Wakefield. The Advanced Learner’s Dictionary of Current English (London: ELBS, 1975).
Husain, Syed Sajjad dan Syed Ali Ashraf. Crisis in Muslim Education (Cambridge: Hodder and Stoughton and King Abdulaziz University, 1979).
Keputusan Bersama Menteri Agama dan Menteri Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan R. I. No. No. 158/1987 (Agama) dan No. 0543 b/U/1987 (Dikbud), tertanggal 22 Januari 1988, tentang Sistem Transliterasi Arab-Indonesia.
Ketetapan Majelis Permusyaratan Rakyat (MPR) RI No. II/MPR/1993, tgl. 9 Maret 1983, tentang Garis-garis Besar Haluan Negara.
Macdonald, Duncan Black. Development of Muslim Theology, Jurisprudence and Constitutional Theory (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1903).
Ma’lūf, Louis. Al-Munjid fil-Lughah (Bairut: Dārul-Masyriq, cetakan ke-11, 1973, reprint, Jakarta: Penerbit Mutiara, cetakan ke-12, 1977).
Nida, Eugene A dan Charles R. Taber. Theory and Practice of Translation (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1969).
Rahman, Fazlur. Islam dan Modernitas, Tentang Transformasi Intelektual, terj. Ahsin Mohammad (Bandung: Penerbit Pustaka, 1405 H/1985 M).
Roget’s Thesaurus (Middlesex, England: Longman Green & Co., Penguin Books, 1979).
Wahbah, Majdī dan Kāmil al-Muhandis. Mu‘jamul-Mustalahātil-‘Arabiyyah fil-Lughati wal-Adab (Bairut: Maktabah Lubnan, cetakan ke-2, 1984).
Yusuf, Suhendra. Teori Terjemah: Pengantar Ke Arah Pendekatan Linguistik dan Sosiolinguistik (Bandung: Mandar Maju, 1994).

Catatan:

*Makalah yang disajikan oleh penulis dalam Lajnah ad-Daurah al-Wataniyyah fī Fununit-Tarjamah wa Tariqatiha (Penataran Nasional tentang Seni dan Metodologi Tarjamah) yang diselenggarakan oleh Universitas Muhammadiyah Surakarta pada tanggal 15-16 Sya‘ban 1416 H, bertepatan dengan tanggal 6-7 Januari 1996.
[1]Suhendra Yusuf, Teori Terjemah: Pengantar Ke Arah Pendekatan Linguistik dan Sosiolinguistik (Bandung: Mandar Maju, 1994), hlm. 44, yang mengutip Harimurti Kridalaksana, Fungsi dan Sikap Bahasa (Ende: Nusa Indah, 1974).
[2]Ibid., hlm. 45.
[3]Ibid.
[4]Ketetapan Majelis Permusyaratan Rakyat (MPR) RI No. II/MPR/1993, tgl. 9 Maret 1983, “F. Kebijaksanaan Pembangunan Lima Tahun Keenam, Kesejahteraan Rakyat, Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan,” angka 2, Pendidikan, butir f.
[5]Fazlur Rahman, Islam dan Modernitas, Tentang Transformasi Intelektual, terj. Ahsin Mohammad (Bandung: Penerbit Pustaka, 1405 H/1985 M), hlm. 150.
[6]Majdī Wahbah dan Kāmil al-Muhandis, Mu‘jamul-Mustalahātil-‘Arabiyyah fil-Lughati wal-Adab (Bairut: Maktabah Lubnan, cetakan ke-2, 1984), hlm. 93.
[7]Louis Ma’lūf, Al-Munjid fil-Lughah (Bairut: Dārul-Masyriq, cetakan ke-11, 1973, reprint, Jakarta: Penerbit Mutiara, cetakan ke-12, 1977), hlm. 60.
[8]Ibid.
[9]Majdī Wahbah dan Kāmil al-Muhandis, ibid., hlm. 94.
[10]A. S. Hornby, E. V. Gatenby dan H. Wakefield, The Advanced Learner’s Dictionary of Current English (London: ELBS, 1975), hlm. 1074.
[11]Roget’s Thesaurus (Middlesex, England: Longman Green & Co., Penguin Books, 1979).
[12]Majdī Wahbah dan Kāmil al-Muhandis, ibid., hlm. 94.
[13]Ibid.
[14]Eugene A. Nida dan Charles R. Taber dalam Theory and Practice of Translation (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1969), hlm. 12 menyatakan: “Translating consists of reproducing in the receptor language the closest natural equivalent of the source language, message, first in terms of meaning and secondly in terms of style.
[15]Lim Kiat Boey, An Introduction to Linguistics for the Language Teacher (Singapore: Singapore University Press, 1975), hlm. 88.
[16]Untuk jelasnya lihat lampiran.
[17]Kalimat Inggris I eat rice, atau kalimat Arab Ana akulu-urza, misalnya, dengan mudah dapat diterjemahkan ke dalam bahasa Indonesia dengan Saya makan nasi, tanpa mengubah susunan maupun pola katanya.
[18]Perbedaan-perbedaan Sistem Transliterasi Arab-Inggris dan Arab-Indonesia dapat dilihat dalam Lampiran.
[19]Syed Sajjad Husain dan Syed Ali Ashraf, Crisis in Muslim Education (Cambridge: Hodder and Stoughton and King Abdulaziz University, 1979), hlm. ix.
[20]Duncan Black Macdonald, Development of Muslim Theology, Jurisprudence and Constitutional Theory (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1903), hlm. 10.
[21]Lim Kiat Boey, ibid., hlm. 100.
[22]Syed Sajjad Husain dan Syed Ali Ashraf, ibid.

LAMPIRAN
PERBANDINGAN SISTEM TRANSLITERASI
ARAB-INGGRIS DAN ARAB-INDONESIA*

I. Konsonan Tunggal

Huruf Arab -- Inggris -- Indonesia -- Keterangan

alif -- -- Tidak dilambangkan

bā’ -- b -- b

tā’ -- t -- t

sā’ -- th -- ś

jīm -- j -- j

hā’ --h -- h -- Dengan titik di bawah

khā’ --kh -- kh

dāl -- d -- d

żāl -- ż -- ż -- Dengan titik di atas

rā’ -- r -- r

zai -- z -- z

sīn --s -- s

syīn -- sh --sy

sād -- s -- s --Dengan titik di bawah

dād -- d -- d --Dengan titik di bawah

tā -- t -- t -- Dengan titik di bawah

zā’ -- z -- z --Dengan titik di bawah

‘ain --‘ --‘ --Apostrof terbalik

gain --gh -- g

fā’ -- f --f

qāf -- q -- q

kāf -- k -- k

lām -- l -- l

mīm -- m -- m

nūn -- n -- n

wawu -- w -- w

hamzah --’ --’ --Apostrof

hā’ -- h -- h

Yā’ -- y -- y

I. Konsonan Rangkap

Konsonan rangkap, termasuk syaddah, ditulis rangkap (Inggris dan Indonesia).

II. Tā’ Marbūtah di Akhir Kata

1. Bila dimatikan, dihilangkan (Inggris) atau ditulis h (Indonesia).
2. Bila dihidupkan karena dirangkaikan dengan kata lain di belakangnya, ditulis t (Inggris dan Indonesia).
   

III. Vokal Pendek
Fathah ditulis a, kasrah ditulis i, dammah ditulis u (Inggris dan Indonesia).

IV. Vokal panjang
A panjang ditulis ā, i panjang ditulis ī, dan u panjang ditulis ū (Inggris dan Indonesia).

V. Vokal rangkap
Fathah + ya tanpa dua titik yang dimatikan ditulis ay (Inggris) atau ai (Indonesia).
Fathah + wawu mati ditulis aw (Inggris) atau au (Indonesia).

VI. Vokal-vokal Pendek Berurutan dalam Satu Kata
Dipsahkan dengan apostrof (Inggris dan Indonesia).

VII. Kata sandang Alif + Lam

1. Bila diikuti huruf qamariyyah ditulis al tanpa tanda hubung (Inggris) atau dengan tanda hubung (Indonesia).
2. Bila diikuti huruf syamsiyyah ditulis al tanpa tanda hubung Inggris), sedangkan dalam Transliterasi Indonesia, ada dua pilihan: (a) ditulis al dengan tanda hubung, atau (b) huruf l diganti dengan huruf syamsiyyah yang mengikutinya dan dengan tanda hubung.
   

VIII. Kata dalam Rangkaian
1. Ditulis kata per kata (Inggris dan Indonesia), atau
2. Ditulis menurut bunyi atau pengucapannya dalam rangkaian tersebut (Indonesia).

*Sistem Transliterasi Arab-Indonesia yang digunakan di sini adalah yang ditetapkan berdasarkan Keputusan Bersama Menteri Agama dan Menteri Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan RI, No. 158/1987 (Agama) dan No. 0543 b/U/1987 (Dikbud), tertanggal 22 Januari 1988.