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Tirukkural, also known as the Kural, an ancient Indian treatise on the ethics and morality of the commoner, is one of the most widely translated non-religious works in the world. Authored by the ancient Tamil poet-philosopher Thiruvalluvar, the work has been translated into 57 languages, with a total of 350 individual translations, including 143 different renderings in the English language alone.
Beginning of translations
The Kural text, considered to have been written in the 1st century BCE,[2] remained unknown to the outside world for close to one and a half millennia. The first translation of the Kural text appeared in Malayalam in 1595 CE under the title Tirukkural Bhasha by an unknown author. It was a prose rendering of the entire Kural, written closely to the spoken Malayalam of that time.[2] However, again, this unpublished manuscript remained obscure until it was first reported by the Annual Report of the Cochin Archeological Department for the year 1933–34.[3] It took another three centuries before the next Malayalam translation was made in 1863 by Perunazhi Krishna Vaidhyan.
The Kural text has enjoyed a universal appeal right from antiquity owing to its secular and non-denominational nature that it suited the sensibilities of all.[4] The universality is such that, despite its having been written in the pre-Christian era, almost every religious group in India and across the world, including Christianity, has claimed the work for itself.[5] Owing to its ethical content, the Kural remained one of the most admired ancient Indian works among the Christian missionaries of the 16th and 17th centuries,[6] who arrived in India during the colonial era and found the Kural text containing many more ideals in addition to those that are similar to their own Christian ideals. This marked the beginning of wider translations of the Kural text.[7]
In 1730, Constantius Joseph Beschi rendered the Kural text into Latin, introducing the work to the Europeans for the first time. However, only the first two books of the Kural text, namely, virtue and wealth, were translated by Beschi, who considered translating the book on love inappropriate for a Christian missionary. Around 1767, an unknown author made the first French translation, which went unnoticed.[7] The Danish Missionary August Friedrich Caemmerer translated it into German in 1803.[6][8] The first available French version, however, was the one made in 1848 by E. S. Ariel. Here again, only parts of the work was translated.[7] In 1856, Karl Graul translated the Kural into German, claiming that the Kural is closer to the Christian preaching and offers a model of Tamil worldview.[6] The German version was published both at London and Leipzig. In 1865, his Latin translation of the Kural text, along with commentaries in Simple Tamil, was posthumously published.[9]
The first English translation ever was attempted by N. E. Kindersley in 1794 when he translated select couplets of the Kural. This was followed by another incomplete attempt by Francis Whyte Ellis in 1812, who translated only 120 couplets—69 in verse and 51 in prose.[10][11][12][13] William Henry Drew translated the first two parts in prose in 1840 and 1852, respectively. Along with Drew's English prose translation, it contained the original Tamil text, the Tamil commentary by Parimelalhagar and Ramanuja Kavirayar's amplification of the commentary. Drew, however, translated only 630 couplets. The remaining portions were translated by John Lazarus, a native missionary, thus providing the first complete English translation. In 1886, George Uglow Pope published the first complete English translation in verse by a single author, which brought the Kural text to a wide audience of the western world.[14]
By the turn of the twenty-first century, the Kural had already been translated to more than 37 world languages,[15] with at least 24 complete translations in English language alone, by both native and non-native scholars. By 2014, the Kural had been translated to more than 42 languages, with 57 versions available in English. Along with the Bible and the Quran, the Kural remains one of the most translated works in the world.[16] In October 2021, the Central Institute of Classical Tamil announced its translating the Kural text into 102 world languages.[17]
Criticisms on translations
The couplets of the Kural are inherently complex by virtue of their dense meaning within their terse structure. Thus, no translation can perfectly reflect the true nature of any given couplet of the Kural unless read and understood in its original Tamil form.[18] Added to this inherent difficulty is the attempt by some scholars to either read their own ideas into the Kural couplets or deliberately misinterpret the message to make it conform to their preconceived notions, a problem of Hermeneutics. The Latin translation by Father Beshi, for instance, contains several such mistranslations noticed by modern scholars. According to V. Ramasamy, "Beschi is purposely distorting the message of the original when he renders பிறவாழி as 'the sea of miserable life' and the phrase பிறவிப்பெருங்கடல் as 'sea of this birth' which has been translated by others as 'the sea of many births'. Beschi means thus 'those who swim the vast sea of miseries'. The concept of rebirth or many births for the same soul is contrary to Christian principle and belief".[7] In August 2022, the governor of Tamil Nadu, R. N. Ravi, criticized Anglican Christian missionary G. U. Pope for "translating with the colonial objective to 'trivialise' the spiritual wisdom of India," resulting in a "de-spiritualised version" of the Kural text.[19]
List of translations
Below is a list of translations of the Kural:[20][21][22]
| S.No. | Language | Translator(s) | Title of the Translation | Place of Publication | Year | Coverage and Form | Notes | Translation for comparison: Kural (verse) 251 (Chapter 26:1) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Arabic | Muhammad Yousuf Kokan | Al-Abiayaatul Muqaddisa (Sacred Verses) | (Hanifa House Printers and Publishers) | 1976–1980 | Complete | Translated from an English translation.[23] | كيف يكون احد رؤوفا ورحيما إن يأكل الحيوانات لا زدياد شحمه ودسمه فى جثـتـه وجسمه |
| Basheer Ahmed Jamali | Chennai (Central Institute of Classical Tamil) | 2014 | Complete | [24] | ||||
| Amar Hasan | Thirukkural | Beirut, Lebanon (Al Farabi Publications) | 2015 | Complete | [25][26] | |||
| Mahmood Fat-hi Sa’d Khalifa | Egypt | |||||||
| K. M. A. Ahamed Zubair | Al- Abyath Al- Baariza: Thirukkural | Shams Publishing Inc. Ltd.,
120 High Road, East Finchley, London, N2 9ED, United Kingdom,2024,Complete.
| ||||||
| A. Jahir Hussain | Thirukkural | Chennai (International Institute of Tamil Studies) | 2020 | Complete–Verse | Translated from Tamil original.[27][28][29] | |||
| 2 | Assamese | B. Vijayakumar | Thirukkural in Assamese | Chennai (Central Institute of Classical Tamil) | 2023 | Complete | Released by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in December 2023[22]: 34 | |
| Malini Goswami | Thirukural | Guwahati (Assam Publication Board) | 2012 | Complete | ||||
| 3 | Awadhi | Ram Lakshan Prajapati Pratagarthit | Thirukkural in Awadhi | Chennai (Central Institute of Classical Tamil) | 2023 | Complete | Released by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in December 2023[22]: 35 | |
| 4 | Badaga | C. P. Krishniah | Thirukkural in Badaga | Chennai (Central Institute of Classical Tamil) | 2022 | Complete | ||
| 5 | Bengali | Nalini Mohan Sanyal | Thirukkural | Calcutta | 1939 | Prose | ||
| E. C. Sastri | Thirukkural | Calcutta | 1974 | Prose | ||||
| N. Ramanuja Das Khardah | Thirukkural | 1993 | Prose | |||||
| S. Krishnamoorthy | Tirukkural (Ancient Tamil Poetry) | Calcutta (Sahityika) | 2001 | Complete—Verse | Reprinted in 2014 by Sahitya Akademi; 148 pages. ISBN 978-81-260-4719-2[30] | |||
| 6 | Bhojpuri | Harish Chandra Mishra | Thirukkural in Bhojpuri | Chennai (Central Institute of Classical Tamil) | 2023 | Complete | ISBN: 978-81-260-4719-2; Released by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in December 2023[22]: 38 | |
| 7 | Burmese | U. Myo Thant | Thirukkural | Rangoon (Kanbe Nattukottai Chettiyar Education Trust)[24] | 1964 | Complete—Prose | 193 pages | |
| 8 | Chinese | Ch'eng Xi | Gula Zhenyan (古臘箴言) | Hong Kong (Hong Kong University Press: Xianggang Daxue Chubanshe) | 1967 | 166 pages | 如何真正实践慈悲谁吃动物肉养肥自己的血肉? | |
| Yu Hsi | Thirukkural | Taipei, Taiwan (Department of Tamil Development and Culture) | 2014 | Complete | ISBN: 978-986-8677-5-0; 267 pages; Book released by former President of India, A. P. J. Abdul Kalam[31] | 以他者的脂肪養胖自己的人， 怎可能是善良的呢？ | ||
| 9 | Creole | Rama Valayden | Port Louis, Mauritius (Calson Printing Ltd) | 2007 | ISBN 978-99903-66-21-1 | |||
| 10 | Czech | Kamil V. Zvelebil | Thirukural (Selections) | Prague | 1952–1954 | Selections | Translated select couplets that appeared in Novy Orient, a Czech journal, during 1952–54.[32] | |
| 11 | Danish | Marianne Steen Isak | Thirukural | (Tamil Danish Socio-Literary Federation) | 2021 | Complete | ||
| 12 | Dutch | D. Kat | Thirukural (Selections) | Netherlands | 1964 | Selections | ||
| 13 | English | Nathaniel Edward Kindersley | Specimens of Hindoo Literature | London (W. Bulmer and Co.) | 1794 | Selections—Verse | Made the first ever translation of the Kural text into English in a chapter titled 'Extracts from the Teroo-Vaulaver Kuddul, or, The Ocean of Wisdom' in his book Specimens of Hindoo Literature[33] | Not translated. |
| Francis Whyte Ellis | Thirukural on Virtue (in verse) with Commentary | Madras | 1812 (reprint 1955) | Selections—Mixed | Incomplete translation—only 120 couplets translated, 69 in verse and 51 in prose | Not translated | ||
| William Henry Drew | The Cural of Thiruvalluvar with Commentary of Parimelazhakar | Madurai (American Mission Press) | 1840 | Partial—Prose | Translated only the first 630 couplets | How can he be possessed of kindness, who, to increase his own flesh, eats the flesh of other (creatures)? | ||
| Charles E. Gover | Odes from the Kural (Folksongs of South India) | Madras (Higginbothams) | 1872 | Selections–Verse | Reprinted in 1981 by Gian Publications, Delhi | |||
| Edward Jewitt Robinson | Tamil Wisdom | London (Paternoster Row) | 1873 | Partial—Verse | Translated only Books I and II (1080 couplets) | What graciousness by those is shown Who feed with others' flesh their own? | ||
| William Henry Drew, and John Lazarus | Thirukural (in verses) | Madras | 1885 | Partial—Prose | Lazarus revised Drew's work and translated the remaining portion (couplets 631 to 1330) in prose as done by Drew, thus making the incomplete work of Drew a complete one. | How can he be possessed of kindness, who, to increase his own flesh, eats the flesh of other (creatures)? | ||
| George Uglow Pope | A Collection of the English Translation of Thirukural | Madras | 1886 | Complete—Verse | First complete translation in English by a single author | How can the wont of 'kindly grace' to him be known, Who other creatures' flesh consumes to feed his own? | ||
| T. Thirunavukarasu | Kural—A Selection of 366 Verses (A Gem for Each Day) | Madras (SPCK Press) | 1915 | Selections—Prose | ||||
| V. V. S. Aiyar | Kural: Maxims of Thiruvalluvar | Madras (Amudha Nilayam)[34] | 1916 | Complete–Prose | How can he feel pity, who eateth other flesh to fatten his own? | |||
| S. Sabaratna Mudaliyar | Kural | Madras | 1920 | |||||
| A. Mathavaiyah | Kural in English with Commentary in Tamil | Madras | 1926 | Selections—Verse | ||||
| T. V. Parameswaran Aiyar | 108 Gems from the Sacred Kural | Kottayam | 1928 | |||||
| H. A. Popley | The Sacred Kural (Selections in verses) | Calcutta | 1931 | Selections—Verse | How can kindliness rule that man, Who eateth other flesh to increase his own? | |||
| A. Ranganatha Muthaliar | Thirukural Moolamum Uraiyum with English Translation | Madras | 1933 | |||||
| C. Rajagopalachari | Kural, the Great Book of Thiruvalluvar | Madras | 1935 | Partial—Prose | ||||
| M. S. Purnalingam Pillai | The Kural in English | Tirunelveli (Sri Kanthimathi Vilasam Press) | 1942 | Complete–Prose | How can a man grace who eats the meat of other animal to fatten himself? | |||
| S. M. Michael | The Sacred Aphorisms of Thiruvalluvar (in verse) | Nagarcoil | 1946 | Complete—Verse | Who eats flesh other his own to expand, How can he grace command? | |||
| V. R. Ramachandra Dikshitar | Thirukural in English with Roman Translation | Madras | 1949 | Complete—Prose | He who fattens on the flesh of animals, can he ever understand the rule of love? | |||
| M. R. Rajagopala Aiyangar | Tirukkural | Kumbakonam | 1950 | Complete–Prose | ||||
| P. Raja | Thirukural (in verses) | Kumbakonam | 1950 | |||||
| A. Chakravarti | Thirukural in English with Commentary | Madras | 1953 | Complete—Prose | How can a person cultivate the habit of universal benevolence if he for the purpose of fattening his own flesh (body) eats flesh of other animals? | |||
| I. D. Thangaswami | Thirukural (Selections in Verse) | Madras | 1954 | Selections—Verse | ||||
| K. M. Balasubramaniam | Thirukural of Thiruvalluvar | Madras | 1962 | Complete—Verse | How can the one who eats a flesh to have his own flesh swell Possess a melting heart in which compassion could e'er dwell? | |||
| T. Muthuswamy | Thirukural in English | Madurai | 1965 | Partial—Prose | ||||
| V. Chinnarajan | The Kural Gems | Udumalpet | 1967 | Selections–Verse | ||||
| C. R. Soundararajan | 1968 | Complete–Prose | ||||||
| Emmons E. White | The Wisdom of India | New York City (The Pater Pauper) | 1968 | Selections–Verse | Published as The Wisdom of the Tamil People in 1976 | |||
| Yogi Suddanantha Bharathi | Thirukural with English Couplets | Madras | 1968 | Complete—Verse | What graciousness can one command Who feeds his flesh by flesh gourmand? | |||
| G. Vanmikanathan | The Thirukural—A Unique Guide to Moral, Material and Spiritual Prosperity | Trichy | 1969 | Complete—Prose | How will he exercise charity, who eats the flesh of another (creature) to fatten his own flesh? | |||
| Kasturi Srinivasan | Thirukural: An Ancient Tamil Classic (in couplets) | Bombay | 1969 | Complete—Verse | To feed his flesh, who flesh consumes What kindly grace, such man presumes? | |||
| A. Gajapathy Nayagar | The Rosary of Gems of Thirukkural | Madras | 1969 | |||||
| Yogi Suddanantha Bharathi | Thirukural Couplets with Clear Prose Rendering | Madras | 1970 | Complete—Prose | ||||
| T. N. S. Ragavachari | Teachings of Tiruvalluvar's Kural | Madras (Health, June 1966 – October 1971) | 1971 | Complete–Prose | Reprinted in 1982 | |||
| E. V. Singan | Tirukkural | Singapore (EVS Enterprises) | 1975 | Complete–Prose | Reprinted in 1982 | |||
| S. N. Sriramadesikan | Tirukkural | Madras (Gangai Puthaka Nilayam) | 1978 | Complete–Prose | Reprinted in 1991, 1994, and 2006 | How can a person be held to be compassionate when he slays animals and eat their flesh, for fattening his own body? | ||
| S. Maharajan | Tiruvalluvar | New Delhi (Sahitya Akademi) | 1979 | Verse—Selections | Translated select couplets from all the three books of the Kural text. Second edition was published in 1982. | How can he be possessed of grace, who, to swell his own flesh, eats the flesh of others! | ||
| S. M. Diaz | Aphorisms of Valluvar: Commentary and Comparative Study | Madras: International Society for the Investigation of Ancient Civilizations | 1982 | Complete—Verse | It is inconsistent with the way of living compassion, To fatten oneself on the flesh of a fellow-creature. | |||
| P. S. Sundaram | Tiruvalluvar: The Kural | New Delhi (Penguin Books India Limited) | 1987 | Complete–Verse | Reprinted in 1989, 1991, 1992, and 2000 by International Tamil Language Foundation, Illinois | How can he be kindly Who fattens himself on others' fat? | ||
| T. S. Ramalingam Pillai | 1987 | |||||||
| K. R. Srinivasa Iyengar | Tirukkural | Calcutta (M. P. Birla Foundation) | 1988 | Complete–Verse | ||||
| M. Karunanidhi/K. Chellappan | Kural—Portraits: Dr. Kalaignar M. Karunanidhi's Kuralovium, a Translation from Tamil by K. Chellappan | Annamalai Nagar: Annamalai University | 1989 | |||||
| M. Swaminathan | 1991 | |||||||
| T. R. Kallapiran | 1995 | |||||||
| D. V. G. Ramarathinam | Tirukkural | (Thiyaga Durgam) | 1995 | Complete–Prose | ||||
| G. N. Das | Readings from Thirukkural | (Abhinav Publications) | 1997 | Select–Verse | Whoever eats other animal's flesh To fatten himself on it How can any hope to find in him, Merciful quality, however slight? | |||
| J. Narayanasamy | Tirukkural | Coimbatore | 1998 | Complete–Mixed | More in prose than in verse. Reprinted in 1999. | Hardly any mercy is left in the minds of those who build their bodies with the flesh of other beings. | ||
| K. Kalia Perumal | Wonders of Tirukkural | Thanjavur (Jayam Publications) | 1999 | Complete–Verse | ||||
| C. B. Acharya | 1999 | |||||||
| Satguru Sivaya Subramuniya Swami | Thirukural | New Delhi (Abhinav Publications) | 1979 | Partial—Verse | Zdroj:https://en.wikipedia.org?pojem=Tirukkural_translations