Layers of Authority in Shāh Walī Allāh's Persian Interlinear Qur’ān Translation

Abstract

This article explores the genealogy of the Persian Qur’ān translation of the eighteenth‐century Indian scholar Shāh Walī Allāh (d. 1762/3). Firstly, I argue that this translation engendered a populist engagement with the Qur’ān, which allowed Walī Allāh to decentralize the interpretive agency of the Mughal scholarly class, all the while building his own authority. Including the Arabic text with the Persian translation allowed lay Muslims to recite the text, but with the new caveat of understanding it. Secondly, I argue that Walī Allāh's amalgamation between ‘under‐the‐line’ and ‘succinct summary’ models in his interlinear translation affirmed the inimitability doctrine. This is the belief that the Qur’ān is inherently defined as an Arabic text, in word and meaning. Thirdly, I argue that the inclusion of the Arabic text in this translation prevented the potential emergence of a hegemonic interpretation by a subversive political authority. The results of this hypothesis can be observed in relation to nineteenth‐century British efforts of translating Islamic law texts into English common law in India; and twentieth‐century attempts by secular nationalists in producing a Turkish‐only Qur’ān in modern Turkey. Walī Allāh's Qur’ān translation also carved a path for later Urdu and English Qur’ān translators to follow.