List of Islamic terms in Arabic
It is sometimes difficult to separate concepts in Islam from concepts specific to Arab
culture, from the language itself. The Qur'an is expressed in Arabic and
traditionally Muslims deemed it untranslatable, though this view has changed somewhat
in recent decades. Concepts that derive from both Islam and Arab tradition, which are expressed as words in the Arabic language, and are sufficiently specific to these to require their own
articles here, are:
A B C D E F G H I
J K L M N O P Q R
S T U V W X Y Z
A
B
- barakah - a blessing. Also, spiritual wisdom and blessing transmitted from master
to pupil
C
- caliph - literally successor; refers to the successor of the prophet Muhammad, the
ruler of the Islamic world
D
- dajjal - the Islamic counterpart to the Antichrist
- da'wa - the call to Islam
- dervish - a Sufi ascetic
- dhimmi - Jews and Christians (and sometimes others), whose right to practice their religion is
tolerated within an Islamic society, but with lower legal status.
E
F
H
- hadith - recorded saying or tradition of the prophet Muhammad validated by isnah; with sira these comprise the sunnah and reveal shariah
- halal - lawful, permitted, good, beneficial, praiseworthy, honourable
- hafiz - someone who knows the Quran by heart. Literal translation = memorizer or
Protector.
- haj or hajj - pilgrimage to Mecca. Sunnis regard
this as the fifth Pillar of Islam
- hanif - the 5 monotheist prophets, namely Prophet Adam, Prophet Abraham/Ibrahim,
Prophet Moses/Musa, Prophet Jesus/Isa and Prophet Muhammad.
- haram - (with a long a) forbidden. Antonym halal. (with a short a)
sanctuary.
- hijab - describes the self-covering of a woman's body for the purposes of modesty and
dignity. A woman must conceal her hair and body from the sight of all men except her husband and immediate relatives. However,
hijab is more than the thickness of the cloth that covers the body; hijab should be a system of behaviour of modesty and
dignity.
- hijra - literally migration, Muhammad's and his followers'
emigration from Mecca to Medina
- hima - wilderness reserve, protected forest, grazing commons, important to khalifa
- hudna - cease fire (often temporary)
- hudud - Literally, limits or boundaries.
Usually refers to limits placed by God on man; penalties of the Islamic law which are described in the Qur'an
I
- ibadah - worship, but not limited to
ritual: all expressions of servitude to Allah from pursuit of knowledge living a pious life, helping, charity, humility
- ihram - state of consecration for haj. Includes
dress and or prayer.
- ijma - the consensus of either the
ummah (or just the ulema) - one of four bases of
Islamic Law. More generally, political consensus itself.
- ijtihad - during the early times of Islam the possibility to find a new solution
to a juridical problem. In consevative Islam not allowed anymore since the Middle Ages.
- ilm - all varieties of knowledge, usually a synonym for science
- imam - literally leader, e.g. a man who leads a community or leads the
prayer; the Shia sect use the term only as a title for one of the twelve God-appointed successors of Prophet Muhammad.
- imamah/imamate - Successorship of Prophet Muhammad and the leadership of mankind. Shias regard this as the fourth Pillar of Islam.
- iman - personal faith
- insha'Allah - God Willing.
- Islam - "submission to God".
- isnad - chain of transmitters of any given hadith
- isnah - process of validating the hadith;
citation methodology
- isra - the night journey during which Muhammad is said to have visited Heaven. See miraj.
- istislah - public interest - a source of Islamic Law.
- istish-haad - heroic
martyrdom.
J
- jahiliya - the time of ignorance before Islam was realized. Describes
polytheistic religions.
- jamia - "gathering", at university, at a
mosque for jumuah prayer, etc.
- jilbab - long outergarment
- jihad - struggle. Any earnest striving in the way of Allah, involving personal,
physical, intellectual or military effort, for righteousness and against wrong-doing;
- "Lesser Jihad": fighting to protect Islam from attack or oppression. In such fighting, no woman, child or innocent civilian
is to be harmed, and no tree is to be cut down. Shias believe that only Prophet Muhammad and the twelve Imams had authority to
declare positive jihad of the lesser kind.
- "Greater Jihad": internal struggle for the soul (nafs) against evil, e.g. to overcome the temptation to sleep when it is time to pray the morning prayer is a greater
jihad.
- jinn - An invisible being of fire
- jumuah - Friday prayer
K
- kafir - "one who refuses to submit to the one true God". Kafirs include polytheists
and atheists.
- kalam - Islamic theology
- khalifa - Man's trusteeship
and stewardship of Earth; Most basic
theory of the Caliphate; Flora and fauna as sacred trust; Accountability to God
for harms to nature, failure to actively care and maintain. Three specific ways in which khalifa is manifested in Muslim practice
are the creation of haram to protect water, hima to
protect other species (including those useful to man), and by resisting infidel domination over Muslim lands, in jihad.
- kufr - the manifestion of not believing in God, aspects of God's law, names and
attributes.
L
M
- madhab - school of religious jurisprudence, school of thought
- madrasa - school, university
- mahdi - "a guide". More specifically al-Mahdi (the guide) is a figure who will appear
with Prophet Jesus before the end of time, when God allows it, to bring world peace, order and justice, after it has been
overcome with injustice and aggression. The Shias regard the twelth Imam as the Mahdi. The Sunnis regard someone else as the
Mahdi.
- masha Allah - God has willed it.
- masum - A person who does not commit sins,
does not make mistakes, does not forget, etc. although he/she does have the choice to commit sins. The Shia regard Prophet
Muhammad, his daughter (Fatimah) and the twelve Imams to be the fourteen Masumin.
- me'ad - the Resurrection; God will
resurrect all of humankind to be judged. Shias regard this as the fifth Pillar of Islam.
- miraj - see isra
- muhajabah - woman who wears hijab
- mujahid - a fighter for Islam
- munaqabah - woman who wears niqab
- murshid - a Sufi teacher
N
P
- purda - not an Arabic term; means "curtain" in Persian. Metaphorically refers to the
practice of secluding women.
Q
S
- salah/salat - any one of the 5 daily obligatory prayers. Sunnis regard this as the
second Pillar of Islam
- salaam - Peace
- sawm - fasting during the month of Ramadhan. Sunnis regard this as the third Pillar of Islam.
- Sayyid - a descendent of any one of the Masumin (the fourteen infallibles)
- sema
- shahadah - The expression of faith: La ilaha illa Allah ("There is no
god but God"). Sunnis regard this as the first Pillar of
Islam
- shaheed - "witness". More specifically refers to a person killed whilst striving
in Islam, a martyr. Often used in modern times for deaths in a political cause (including victims of soldiers, deaths in battle,
suicide bombers, etc.)
- shaikh - a spiritual master
- sharia/shariah - "the path to a
watering hole"; the eternal ethical code and moral code based on Quran and sunnah; basis of fiqh
- Sharif
- shia - a follower of Prophet Muhammad and his successors (the twelve Imams), the first
being Ali. Shias constitute the second largest sect in
Islam.
- shirk - idolatry, the sin of believing in any divinity
except Allah
- shura - consultation. majlis ash-shura - advisory council
- sira - life or biography of the Prophet Muhammad; his moral example - with hadith this comprises the sunnah
- sufi - a Muslim mystic; Sufism (tasawwuf)
is a fairly recent sect in Islam.
- sunnah - "path" or "example"; sunnah annabi is what the Prophet has done or said or
agreed to; He is considered as the best human moral example by Muslims, the best man to follow;
- sunni - the largest sect in Islam, having no single central authority
- sura - chapter; the Quran is comprised of 114
suras
T
- tafsir - exegesis, particularly such
commentary on the Qur'an
- tajwid - special manner of reading the
Quran. When you do it, you get more rewards for your reading.
- taqlid - blind imitation of precedent, normally of a classical jurist of fiqh, contrast to
ijtihad and ijma which imply status for the
community and lay public.
- taqiyya - the mostly Shia principle that one is allowed to hide one's true belief
in certain circumstances.
- tasawwuf or sufism
- tarkib
- tariqa - a Muslim religious order, particularly a Sufi order
- tartil - slow and measured (meditative)
recitation of the Koran
- tawheed - monotheism;
affirmation of the Oneness of God. Shias regard this as the first Pillar of Islam. The opposite of Tawheed is shirk
U
- ulema or ulama - the leaders of Islamic society, including teachers, Imams and
judges
- ummah or umma - the global community of all Muslim believers; international
personhood of Islam
- urf - custom of a given society, leading to
change in the fiqh
W
- wahdat al-wujud - "unity
of being". Philosophical term used by some Sufis. Related to fana
- warraq - traditional scribe, publisher,
printer, notary and book copier
Z
- zakat - tax, alms as a Muslim duty; Sunnis regard this as the fourth Pillar of Islam. Neither charity nor derived from Islamic economics, but a religious duty and social obligation.
- zina - sexual activity outside marriage (covering the English words adultery and fornication)
NOTE: BambooWeb is not a general Arabic-to-English dictionary. The list above includes only those concepts sufficiently
specific to Islam or Muslim culture to merit their own full articles. The prime purposes of this list are to
disambiguate multiple spellings, make note of spellings no longer in use for these concepts, define the concept in one line to
make it easy to pin down the one you're looking for, and provide a guide to unique concepts of Islam all in one place.
There is an English/Arabic dictionary on wiktionary.
Other notes
The English word algorithm is derived from the name of the inventor of
algebra - an Arabic word like alchemy,
alcohol, azimuth, nadir, zenith and oasis,
which mean the same as in English.
Arabic numerals are what we use in English ("0", "1", "2",...).
The modern Arabs in Arabia generally use the Hindi numerals.
Some English words or phrases would translate very poorly into Arabic for cultural reasons, for instance the English word
"crusade" would most likely be interpreted as meaning "genocide", and "infinite justice" would most likely be interpreted as meaning "divine judgement" - adl in Arabic implying Allah's justice. Probably it is best
to avoid such terms for anything one intends to translate into Arabic, or knows will be translated.
Some Islamic concepts are usually referred to in Persian or Turkic. Those are typically of later origin that the concepts
listed here - for completeness it may be best to list Persian terms and those unique to Shia on their own page, likewise Turkic
terms and those unique to the Ottoman period on their own page, as these are culturally very distinct.
References
Related articles
-This article has been brought to you by BambooWeb and Wikipedia-
