UPDATE
An announcement has been made by Majlis Syura Ulama PAS. The decision is – NO to translation of God to Allah in malay language Bible. Refer here.
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
I think some may have noted and followed this development.
And I supposed this is the best explanation available from PAS, in which, has also being this blog have been trying to explain most of the time in regards to this issue. This blog has been consistent saying that even though there’s no restriction in Quran to forbid non-muslim to use “Allah” word, under certain circumstances in Malaysia, it is suggested that non-muslim should not be allowed to use it as translation to God in Malay language Bible.
Please find below explanation by Nik Abduh of PAS, in Malay language.
If you need the translation in English, do let me know (as as the point of publishing this article, I am very much tired of those political minded and hard headed to listen to what has been tried to explain the rationale).
Please, DO NOT jump into conclusion whenever someone says can or can not. Read the rationale. DO NOT jump the gun. DO NOT labelled those opposing the translation of word “God” to Allah in malay language Bible as “sesat”, “kafir”, UMNO, BN or whatever.
Question on the street: Are we clearer on this issue?
Salam.
If we read this explanation from this website:
http://www.arabbible.com/t-Allah.aspx
we would surely understand that Allah and Al-Ilah is two different proper nouns. One is proper noun for Islamic God (Allah), while the other is also a proper noun for The God, that is used for Christian God. The Arab Bible is using Al-Ilah, rather than Allah to refer to the God.
An excerpt from the website:
What could be some consequences of using the common noun “al-ilaah” (the god) to refer to God? First, since the word “ilaah” is entirely Arabic, there is no introduction of some culturally confusing terminology. Every Arab knows this word can refer to a god. And when we add the definite article to it, it immediately narrows the field to a single god. But it will also cause Muslims to wonder why the Islamic term “Allah” is not used, while at the same time, help him to realize that “al-ilaah” is actually a perfectly acceptable Arabic word referring to God. This may indeed be an opportunity to share the fact that we worship different deities altogether…
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Now, we wonder why the non-Muslim, especially the Christian here demanding that the word Allah be allowed to use in their Bible?
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