Masnavi.net translation mismatch?

[Kevin Butts]

Assalamu alaykum, Sidi Ibrahim,

I pray this message find you well.

I may have found a mismatch in a verse between the Persian and the English at Masnavi.net; it seems the English reflects a different Persian Vorlage (which I have also found online).

Based on your notes here about Nicholson's translation, I understand you're aware of these discrepancies, and there's no need to report them. Is this correct? (Please forgive my lack of familiarity.)

(In case it be of benefit, the line is Masnavi I:1178; for the alternate Vorlage see here.)

God bless you and reward you, Sidi, ameen!

Kevin

[Ibrahim]

Dear Kevin,

You wrote about a clash (between the English translation and the Persian text & recitation) in the second half of a Masnavi couplet in Book 1.

Book 1: 1178b, Nicholson’s text (1925) was, reshta-ye āymān-mā be-g’sesta shod, which he translated, “the thread of our covenants is broken.” But after he received a copy of the oldest manuscript of Masnavi (the “Konya MS,” or  “G”), he made an appendix of corrections needed to bring his translation of Books 1-3 into conformity with the Konya MS (at the end of his translation of Books 3 and 4): “1178: after ‘lion,’ read: this is what happened to me, and it has been told to thee (just as it happened). In his Commentary on Book 1 (1937) he said: ”In the second hemistich the oldest MS. has Hāl-e man īn būd-o bā tū gofta shod…. This seems to have been the  original form of the verse before  it as corrected’ by copyists.”

In 2015, I had all of Nicholson’s corrections from his appendixes uploaded to the English translations on masnavi.net. But (except for the “Song of the Reed”) I didn’t try to correct the huge amount of errors in Nicholson’s Persian text (that is, in the first two and a half books) which did not conform to the Konya MS. I only corrected the English. The only corrections that I am currently uploading are for the English translation, mainly scanning errors. We (that is, the original Masnavi Project team) did not scan Nicholson’s translation, but took it from the Internet with all its scanning errors.

You have found the original Persian text for  the second half of this verse on ganjoor.net. This is because the ganjoor.net text of the Masnavi is from Dr. Soroush’s text which is based on the Konya Manuscript. We almost switched the Persian text from that of Yazdī’s to that of Soroush’s, but that would have caused clashes with the audio recitations and with the verse numberings. And since Yazdi’s text follows Nicholson’s original numberings of verses (the international standard), and since the audio recordings  mostly follow the Yazdi text), we decided not to make any such large changes.

Ibrahim

[Kevin Butts]

Jazak Allahu khayran, Sidi :)

I understand, then, that any other such mismatches I encounter need not be reported.

If by English scanning errors you mean typos, in-sha'Allah I can plan to report these if I come across them.

God bless and reward you, ameen!

Kevin

[Ibrahim]

Dear Kevin,

As-salāmu 'alaykum,

Yes, I would appreciate anyone who takes the time to inform me of errors in the English translation on masnavi.net These may look like typewritten mistakes (typos) but they are actually scanning errors.

 Here are some examples from my current list of verses to correct:

4:1956, FROM: nQt that

TO: Little by little cut (yourself) off from the (material) foods –– for these are the nutriment of an ass, not that of a free (noble) man ––

6:1670, FROM: 1670 For God hath…

TO: For God hath provided the motives of anger and (thus) hath cause those shameful things to be divulged.

6:1736, FROM: Mervand Balkh

TO: Deem bitter tribulation to be a (Divine) mercy, deem the kingdom of Merv and Balkh to be a (Divine) vengeance.

3:232, FROM: dead b[#]d

TO: He has put forward a dead bird, (pretending) that this (bird) is making this plaintive noise and cry.

Ibrahim