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Translating the Koran
August 07, 2006
If reading the Koran is not on your list of things to do, then here’s a reason you might want to add it: A translation of Islam’s holy book is now available in Latvian. The poet Uldis Bērziņš has been working on the translation for a number of years. Thanks to Juris Žagariņš of Massachusetts, some of the translated holy book can be downloaded from the Web page Topošais Korana latviskojums.
Thanks to the newspaper Diena, which passed on word of the translation on its Web site.
— Andris Straumanis
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Comments about this article
Istais Latvietis
oh yeah just what we Latvians need islam, the religion about the shoe shining boy, who happened to be a prophet, and who dated preteens.
22 Aug 2006 (Latvia)
Veronika
I almost agree with Istais-L... Islam is an Arab-based religion, still unable to blend harmoniously with "Europeanness". Arab culture is implied in every step of Muslim worship. Europe should dedicate its efforts to build a strong spiritual identity, instead of embracing foreign weltanschauungs. Tolerance, always...Melting, never (wasn't it the key of our forefathers' success throughout History?)
09 Sep 2006 (Uruguay)
Osttruppen
It's interesting why any European must study islam, does it have any connection to european culture? Islam is the most ruthless religion, for example women have almost no rightes, a little girl is first owned by his father, then by husband...
12 Sep 2006 (Armenia)
Charlotte
I think it's good that Europeans read the Qu'ran for themselves. Then they will discover just how 'peaceful' the religion is! I was duped by the media saying how misunderstood Muslims were until I sat down and atually read the thing! It's a violent and backwards religion that has stolen parts of the Christian and Jewish religions and twisted it into basically a guide and justification for wiping out 'non-believers' through any means necessary! I wish more people would read it instead of believing every lie the government and media tell them!
15 Sep 2006 (Great Britain (UK))
disagree
being agree to everything else, ostruppen; that's not true about 'the girl being owned by father.' that's a lie. it's not good to believe everything you told.
29 Sep 2006 (Turkey)
Talivaldis
What kind of religion offers 70 virgins to suicide bombers? Yes, it is in the Koran. It is also a huge joke becaause there are not 70 Muslim virgins in the world. Women unlucky enough to be born Muslim are already screwed at birth! C'est la vie.
07 Oct 2006 (United States)
Mo
I don not think that 1.3 billion of the world's population have made the wrong choice by accepting islam as their religion and arabs by the way are only small minority and make less than 5 percent of followers of islam. Islam unlike christianity is not propagated through mercenary and people who accept islam do so because of their own choice. Also people who propagate islam do not give away handout to lure poor people and thus take advantage of them but rather they challenge people intellectually and present to them facts. For those of you who are yapping about european culture i guess you are not properly schooled and because if you did by now you would have known that islam played a major role in european civilization. Perhaps you can say islam brought light to europe when it was in the dark ages and if it was not islam then probably europe would have been still in a dark age. To conclude please do your self a favor and perhaps spend sometime learning about islam before you say anything about the Holly scriptures of this great religion.
07 Oct 2007 (Canada)
Aiva
Finally!!! It's nice to have a Latvian translation of the Koran. Most Latvians had to do with a Russian translation... not anymore. I have a lot of muslim friends and the reason I like them is cuz they are simply nice people. Islamophobes need to realize that people don't live in the medieval times anymore. Now we have access to information more easily than ever before. So, don't go around brainwashing people with your poison. If I wanted, I could pick-out verses from the Bible and prove that its a war-mongering paedophilic religion. The same goes for the Torah. Well, the Torah doesn't even consider non-jews to be human! Talk about humanism! Kudos to Berzins!! My Latvian is not what it used to be, but atleast I know that I could get a Latvian Koran if I ever wanted one.
30 Oct 2007 (Europe)
perkonu spars
Yes what a wonderful and peace loving religion Islam is and we should all know about it. To think, infidels should not be mixed with and be killed where possible, should you dare to convert from Islam you must be killed, if you question or critisize the prophet you are to be killed etc. This is not medieval times, is is today. I dont see any religious freedom in Saudi Arabia. Read the book but not what we need in Latvia.
01 Nov 2007 (Canada)
Edmunds
The odd thing about islam is it's many quotes from the bible.Some may be amazed that it holds christians in high regard in some ways as being truly spiritual.Also Mohammed holds Jesus in High regard as a profet .Yes we hear much negative about Islam but there are some things to remember.There are two Kinds of Islam One Radical and the other peace loving and kind.And They opposed communist Regime and helped to undermime it.The reason being the communist system of eradicating religion and faith as a threat to their system,as they later found to be true.Remember they too fought against the Soviets.Do not be so narrow minded as to think all of Islam wants to Conquer the earth and bring about monotheism in the name of Mohammed.Peace is what most people want regardless of their beliefs.We are an educated people and must be mindfull to seek the truth.History will bear this out.
08 Nov 2007 (United States)