A Critical Review of the Book Philosophical Ideas of Ibn Sīnā (Festschrift for Dr. Gholamhossein Ebrahimi Dinani)
Document Type : pajoohesh
Author
Assistant Professor, Islamic Sciences and Culture Academy
10.22081/jap.2025.79048
Abstract
The publication of flawed and substandard translations within a given field not only disseminates inaccurate information but, over time, normalizes unstable and defective renderings and thereby lowers the expected level of accuracy and reliability in translated texts. The outcome of this process is the corruption of the scholarly “temperament,” the degradation of readers’ taste and judgment, and the distortion of their academic standards. Hence, the critique of weak translations rife with lapses and errors is a necessary and worthwhile endeavor. The present article reviews and critiques a number of translated essays—rendered by different translators—published in the large volume Philosophical Ideas of Ibn Sīnā (a Festschrift for Dr. Gholamhossein Ebrahimi Dinani). Among the observable flaws in these translations are minor and major mistakes in rendering phrases, gross errors in the reading and writing of names and technical terms, ambiguous and unintelligible sentences, awkward and unstable prose, and various orthographic, typographical, and editorial mistakes. Proceeding to publish such translations without careful evaluation and the correction of their deficiencies and errors is indicative of the unawareness and negligence of the volume’s compiler, supervising editor, and publisher.
Keywords
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