WASHINGTON — Historical Islamic books and other works previously only available in Arabic have been translated into English through a program at Brigham Young University that receives funding from the Library of Congress.
Andrew C. Skinner, executive director of BYU’s Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship, gave Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah, copies of the several translated volumes in Washington Tuesday as a way to thank him for helping secure the federal funding needed to produce them.
In 2005, Bennett worked to get $500,000 from the Library of Congress’ budget to go toward the Middle Eastern Text Initiative at BYU and another $250,000 in 2006, according to his office. Congress did not pass any spending bills for 2007, but Bennett has requested a final $250,000 from the library’s budget for the project in the current spending negotiations for 2008.
Daniel Peterson, director of the METI project and a BYU professor of Islamic students and Arabic, said the project was designed out of “respect” to the Islamic world and the Middle East. Because a lot of early texts have never been translated into English, scholars who do not know Arabic have never been able to include them in their studies — leaving out significant contributions to philosophy, science and medicine and other subject areas.
Peterson said he wanted to break the stereotypes that the Middle East is just “wandering nomads and terrorists” and bring some of the important scholarly works to light.
Peterson said the translations are not BYU or The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints speaking for the Muslim world but the Muslim texts speaking for themselves as a way to help educate others about the culture.
Since its inception in 1992, the initiative has published 13 English translations from Arabic or Syriac writings by Middle Eastern philosophers, theologians, scientists and physicians through its four projects: The Islamic Translation Series, the dual-language Eastern Christian Texts, the English-only Library of the Christian East, and the Medical Works of Moses Maimonides. Peterson said 10 of the books have been financed by the university and private donations, but he has a goal of translating and publishing 100 works.
Bennett described the translated works as “not ancient” but “very old.”
“The work done by METI not only adds to our intellectual understanding of past civilizations, it also fosters bridge-building between cultures today,” Bennett said. “Officials from Egypt, Jordan and Kuwait have publicly praised and recognized BYU’s effort to bring these great scientific, philosophical and religious treasures of the Islamic world forward, and I am happy to lend my support.”
Bennett said when he has met with ambassadors and other diplomats they have showed sincere appreciation for the project.
“You can get the standard polite statement, and then you know when they really mean it,” Bennett said. “This is what we need between the U.S. and other countries.”
