Wrong Translation

[MouhyiHacker]

Assalamu Alaikum wa Rahmatullahi wa Barakatuh,

Dear Sunnah.com Team,

While studying Sahih al-Bukhari 5133 on your website, I noticed a potential mistranslation. The Arabic reads:

حَدَّثَنَا مُحَمَّدُ بْنُ يُوسُفَ، … وَمَكَثَتْ عِنْدَهُ تِسْعًا.

Currently, it is translated as “consummated the marriage at nine,” but مَكَثَتْ literally means “she stayed with him” and does not refer to consummation.

Additionally, the phrase أُدْخِلَتْ عَلَيْهِ (“she was brought to him”) indicates that the marriage was arranged or that she was brought into the household, but it does not explicitly describe sexual activity.

I kindly request that this translation be reviewed and corrected to accurately reflect the original text. If Sunnah.com would like to credit me for pointing this out, I would be happy.

Best regards,
عبد المحيي
Abdul Mouhyi
Instagram: sono_senshi
Email: kawaiibro9@gmail.com

[TaqiHamoda]

Salam Alaikum,

I am not part of the Sunnah.com team but I took a look at this issue you raised with regard to this hadith. There seems to be a bit of confusion here. The word مَكَثَتْ is translated correctly as "she remained" in the hadith and has nothing to do with the "consummated the marriage" part.

Regarding the second part of your issue, although أُدْخِلَتْ عَلَيْهِ doesn't explicitly describe "sexual activity" as you put it above, with how Arabic was traditionally spoken as well as how intimate relationships were described culturally back then, this term does imply the consummation of marriage and always has been understood as such. It has nothing to do with the marriage being arranged though, I believe that is another misunderstanding.

You can always take it literally at face value as "she was entered upon him", but that would result in a misleading and disingenuous translation as you are translating the individual words and not the meanings. This phrase is universally agreed upon by scholars as indicating the consummation of marriage.

Lastly, on a small, personal note from someone who maintains open-source software and services, please try to be more kind and polite when bringing up potential issues or requesting changes. Instead of assuming that the team made a mistake, you can instead take the approach of asking for clarification; something like "is my understanding of this hadith correct" is much more elegant than "kindly" demanding that "this translation be reviewed and corrected to accurately reflect the original text".

Our deen always teaches us to be kind, gracious, and patient with others. I understand that you are well-meaning and I appreciate you bringing up these concerns you have but, oftentimes, how we word things makes a huge difference to others.

Thank you for your patience and understanding brother.
Jazzak Allahu Khayran