Arabic Words


June 7, 2002


BROOKE GLADSTONE: We're back with On the Media. I'm Brooke Gladstone.

BOB GARFIELD: And I'm Bob Garfield. Last week a Harvard student planning to speak at graduation about his own personal struggles created a furor because the word he used to describe that struggle was "jihad." The translation from Arabic was accurate, but protesters complained that in the current environment wherein jihad is more commonly translated as "holy war," the more innocuous definition was lost and the effect incendiary. They may have been correct, but it may be that the perversion of meaning comes not at the hands of an irresponsibly provocative Harvard student but by the so-called "jihadists" themselves who have exploited the linguistic ambiguities of the Koran and Arabic in general as part of their political agenda. Joining us now is Amir Taheri, an Iranian journalist who lives in Paris, edits the magazine Politique Internationale, and is a senior columnist for the Pan-Arab dailies Ashang al-Awsat and Arab News. Mr. Taheri, welcome to On the Media.

AMIR TAHERI: Thank you very much.

BOB GARFIELD: Let's start with "jihad." What's your read on the true definition of "jihad."

AMIR TAHERI: Well "jihad" has two kinds -- jihad [ol ACK bar] -- means the greater struggle which is against oneself -- you know to become a good person -- and jihad [ol AHF kar] [sp?] -- the literal struggle, which is holy war which is waged when Muslims are attacked and is a defensive war. What is not understood in the West is that there is another kind of war in Islam which nobody talks about and that is [KAHZ oo bah] which was waged by the Prophet and by all Muslim conquerors and [KAHZ oo bah]'s aim is to conquer new land and territory and of course new converts for Islam. So you know there is a big confusion between jihad and [KAHZ oo bah] in the minds of the Westerners, especially the Islamic scholars in the United States.

BOB GARFIELD:Well there are a lot of Islamic clerics and militants the world over who have embraced the word jihad to describe their fight against the West, against Western values, against Israel, against Christianity and against the United States. What are they talking about?

AMIR TAHERI: They want to show their war to be defensive. You know in some cases, in fact, what they are doing is [KAHZ oo bah] which means "aggressive war." But they want to say that you know we are-- we are being attacked; therefore we are defending ourselves-- in a holy war. And they don't call themselves [moo JAH hair] which means, you know, the person who wages jihad; they call them jihadi which is you know a new term and they have invented many new terms in order to get around very complicated Islamic rules that apply to jihad, to [KAHZ oo bah], to holy war and to other matters that regulate Islam's relationship with the outside world.

BOB GARFIELD:Well here's what I don't understand. If the leaders of these madrassahs and the suicide bombers themselves are so motivated by their faith, and if these madrassahs drill into the heads of the faithful the words of the Koran to the point that it is the only book these students have ever learned--

AMIR TAHERI: Yeah--

BOB GARFIELD: -- and if the Koran is so explicit, how can they still endorse these practices in apparent defiance of God's law?

AMIR TAHERI: Just the way it is written in Arabic which is the language of about say 15 percent of the Muslims, and even those 15 percent really don't understand it, because it is very archaic language. Discussing the Koran is very complicated, you know, in a short time. It is full of contradictions. There is no chronology. There are many repetitions, and there are of course numerous very ambiguous words and terms. So it is a very, very difficult text, and it could be interpreted virtually to mean anything. And it has been interpreted to mean virtually anything.

BOB GARFIELD:Rick Davis who is reporting a piece for us right after this interview actually spent many years in the Middle East and he told us a story of a businessman there who says "never get the contract in Arabic, because the words have so many meanings that they're all but unenforceable." Is Arabic such linguistic jello that you can never nail it to the wall?

AMIR TAHERI: Yes. This is a language without the key verb "to be" and the verb "to have." Therefore, you know, you can never know an action - in Arabic - when it has taken place. You know it is always suspended in the air. And you cannot also know who owns what. So these, these are the ambiguities.

BOB GARFIELD: Is there a linguistic solution to lay the ground for a political solution?

AMIR TAHERI:Yes! The linguistic solution is what some courageous Arab writers are already doing. Of course you know many Arab writers have decided to write in French or English or German or even Dutch, you know, to liberate themselves from their background, but there are some that are writing in the vernacular, but their works are censored! But you know sooner or later there is no escape. You know they have to create harmony between the language in which they think and the language in which they conduct their political life.

BOB GARFIELD: All right. Thank you very much.

AMIR TAHERI: [That is] fine.

BOB GARFIELD:Amir Taheri is editor of Politique Internationale and a senior columnist for Ashang al-Awsat and Arab News. He joined us from London.