The average Malay Muslim has been told so often that he is incapable of understanding the Qur'an on his own, that he is utterly dependent on someone else's interpretation to the point that the interpretation is now akin to the word of God Himself.
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As a result, these man-made interpretations cannot be questioned, and a different understanding of the verses cannot be comprehended or processed.
To be fair, there is no real basis for comparison, because he thinks he will not be able to understand a pure translation.
Because these interpretations have been accepted for centuries, the Qur'an is anchored to the period in which the interpretations were made, instead of being interpreted in light of the currently available evidence.
And instead of being guidance for all time that can be interpreted in any era, the Qur'an is reduced to being a historical document interpreted through 7th-century mores.
It's no wonder that Islam is seen as an archaic faith, unable to cope with changes in humanity as it develops through the millennia.
And it's ironic that God's guidance should be seen as separate from God's creation, while the creation itself evolves in accordance with His laws
If we do need an interpretation, we should have one made in the 21st-century, for 21st-century humans.
More importantly, the interpretation should depend entirely on the Qur'an itself instead of historical records of the messenger, whose job was only to convey the Message.
But interpretations have an inherent danger of becoming calcified, as it has done before. Furthermore, this calcification places us in danger of shirk, if we were to depend entirely on it as if it were the actual word of God.
This danger is not limited to non-Arabic speakers - for there are many native Arabic speakers who do not read classical Arabic which they think the Qur'an is in, and depend on interpretations for their understanding as much as non-Arabic speakers.
The alternative, then, is to produce a faithful and pure translation without any influence from any text that can be anchored to a particular era.
Readers can then read this translation and understand it in the era that they live in, be it in the 21st, or 30th century or beyond.
To do this, we have to first recognize that as God says, the Qur'an is complete in and of itself (7:52, 11:1). It explains itself (10:37, 75:19) and self-references for clarity (17:89, 18:54)
This means it has its own language (based on Arabic), own definitions, and contexts.
Once we recognize this, the next step would be to produce a glossary of the terms used in the Qur'an as defined by the Qur'an itself.
Then, we can proceed to make a pure translation that can be understood in any era, free from the anchor of time, an interpreter, or both.
It's hard to defend your faith against detractors because there are so many similarities between the Taliban / ISIS and traditional Islam
Quran ✅
Sunnah & Hadith ✅
Ijma' (consensus) ✅
Qiyas (analogy) ✅
Even the attestation of faith is the same ✅
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In Shafi'i-centric Malaysia, there is even some amount of support for the Taliban.
So how can you glibly say "They are not Islam" to non-Muslims?
Are you even allowed to declare others who call themselves Muslims "non-Muslims"?
The minutiae of faith and actions are opaque to non-practitioners. Even practitioners themselves quibble over matters (hence ijma'), so how do you expect non-Muslims to know these fine details?
Actually, there is no specification of gender in the preceding verses at all - in fact, God mentions "For those who were mindful", meaning any and all genders get companions
Let's read from 78:31...
78:31 For those who were mindful of God there is a great achievement,
78:32 gardens and grapevines,
78:33 splendid companions, well-matched,
78:34 and a full cup.
And afterwards, we will find that conventional banking, with the policies that are reasonably good and equitable, is already Islamic, without needing specific labels.
And there is no need to compel people to use it either because the right way is clear from error.
But it's really difficult to get people to do so.
Even Islamic Banking experts who know there is something definitely wrong with it – and prefer to use conventional banking – are still not willing to find out what the Qur'an is actually saying.
So there's this huge flood one day, and an entire town looks like it's going to be swallowed up by the waters. And the Police and Rescue Agencies are running all over the place trying to get people to safety.
So they send the rescue boat over to this house where a guy's sitting on the roof with the water lapping around his ankles and they say "Come on, quickly, there isn't much time"
To which he says "Nah, it's ok, God will provide"
About an hour later they're zooming past in the boat again and they notice the guy's still there, only the water's up to his waist... "Quick" they say, get in the boat, it's going to get worse before it gets better.
"Nah, don't worry - God will provide"
Practical Solution from the Qur'an for the Palestinian.
The conflict that began after WW2 has not shown any signs of ending towards peace, but only continuous sufferings by both parties.
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Unfortunately, it is the Palestinians who are receiving the biggest blow in this conflict while Israel continues to dominate through its systematic aggression and expansion activities.
Hamas, Fatah, PLO have all failed to offer practical solutions to the Palestinians but remained with the same approach that had never delivered practical solutions, while the Israelis continued to expand their territories.