quran-pull

This repository contains the holy book, The Qur'an, in its original Arabic and as translations in English, Farsi, and Portuguese. The contents are made available in JSON, and SQL files.

Navigation

1. src/json/directory
2. src/sql/ directory
3. bin/ directory

src/json/ directory

This section covers the JSON files. Click here to jump to the SQL section.

• The src/json/chapter-metadata.json file contains information about each chapter in The Qur'an.

• The src/json/ar/ directory contains The Qur'an in its original Arabic.

• The src/json/en/ directory contains an English translation of The Qur'an.

• The src/json/fa/ directory contains a Farsi translation of The Qur'an.

• The src/json/pt/ directory contains a Portuguese translation of The Qur'an.

Chapters

• src/json/chapter-metadata.json

The chapter-metadata.json file was obtained from https://quran.com, and modified slightly.

The chapter-metadata.json file contains information about each chapter in The Qur'an. It is structured as an array of objects, with each object describing a given chapter. The following example demonstrates how Al-Fatihah is described as an object. The "codepoints" property is a sequence of unicode codepoints can be mapped back to an Arabic word:

  {
    "id": "1",
    "place_of_revelation": "makkah",
    "transliterated_name": "Al-Fatihah",
    "translated_name": "The Opener",
    "verse_count": 7,
    "slug": "al-fatihah",
    "codepoints": [
      1575,
      1604,
      1601,
      1575,
      1578,
      1581,
      1577
    ]
  },

Arabic

• src/json/ar/

The Arabic translation was obtained from the website https://sacred-texts.com.

Each JSON file represents a chapter, or surah - in its original Arabic. For example, src/json/ar/1.json contains Al-Fatihah. The structure of the file can be described as an array of arrays, with each array representing a verse, or ayah. For example:

[
  [
    <verse number>,
    <verse contents>
  ],
  [
    <verse number>,
    <verse contents>
  ],
  [
    <verse number>,
    <verse contents>
  ],
  /* etc... */
]

English

• src/json/en/

The English translation is a copy of "The Clear Quran" - by Dr. Mustafa Khattab, and it was obtained from the website https://quran.com.

Each JSON file represents a chapter, or surah - as an English translation. The structure of the file can be described as an array of arrays, with each array representing a verse, or ayah. For example, consider the English translation of Al-Fatihah (src/json/en/1.json):

[
  [
    1,
    "In the Name of Allah—the Most Compassionate, Most Merciful."
  ],
  [
    2,
    "All praise is for Allah—Lord of all worlds,"
  ],
  [
    3,
    "the Most Compassionate, Most Merciful,"
  ],
  [
    4,
    "Master of the Day of Judgment."
  ],
  [
    5,
    "You ˹alone˺ we worship and You ˹alone˺ we ask for help."
  ],
  [
    6,
    "Guide us along the Straight Path,"
  ],
  [
    7,
    "the Path of those You have blessed—not those You are displeased with, or those who are astray. "
  ]
]

Farsi

• src/json/fa/

The Farsi translation was obtained from the website https://al-quran.cc.

Each JSON file represents a chapter, or surah - as a Farsi translation. For example, src/json/fa/1.json contains Al-Fatihah. The structure of the file can be described as an array of arrays, with each array representing a verse, or ayah. For example:

[
  [
    <verse number>,
    <verse contents>
  ],
  [
    <verse number>,
    <verse contents>
  ],
  [
    <verse number>,
    <verse contents>
  ],
  /* etc... */
]

Portuguese

• src/json/pt/

The Portuguese translation was obtained from the website https://al-quran.cc.

Each JSON file represents a chapter, or surah - as a Portuguese translation. For example, src/pt/1.json contains Al-Fatihah. The structure of the file can be described as an array of arrays, with each array representing a verse, or ayah. For example:

[
  [
    <verse number>,
    <verse contents>
  ],
  [
    <verse number>,
    <verse contents>
  ],
  [
    <verse number>,
    <verse contents>
  ],
  /* etc... */
]

src/sql/ directory

This section covers the SQL files.

• The src/sql/schema.sql defines the schema of the database.
  The schema is composed of three tables: qurans, chapters, and verses.

• The src/sql/seed.sql populates the contents of the database.
  The languages included are Arabic, English, Farsi, and Portuguese.

• The src/sql/queries/ directory contains .sql files that contain SQL queries.
  They serve as examples, and as inspiration for writing new queries.

SQLite3

This section of the README demonstrates how the SQL files mentioned above can be used to create a fully populated database in memory, how to query the database, and how to save the database to disk for future use.

It is assumed that the repository has been cloned or downloaded (see below), and that "sqlite3" is started from the root of the repository. Other SQL databases, such as MySQL, and PostgreSQL should be able to import the SQL files as well, but have not been tested.

1. $HOME/.sqliterc

For identical results, it is recommended that the $HOME/.sqliterc file has the following contents:

PRAGMA case_sensitive_like=ON;
pragma FOREIGN_KEYS = on;
.headers on
.mode column

2. Import / save the database to disk

The .save command can be used to save the database to disk permanently. This helps avoid continually importing the database into memory - which is done by steps 1 and 2 in this example:

sqlite> .read src/sql/schema.sql
sqlite> .read src/sql/seed.sql
sqlite> .save src/sql/quran.db
sqlite> .exit

From now on, sqlite3 can be started with the path to the database saved to disk instead loading into memory each time:

$ sqlite3 src/sql/quran.db
sqlite> SELECT qurans.id FROM qurans WHERE qurans.locale = 'ar';
id
--
1
sqlite>

5. Query the database

5.1

After the previous steps, the database is fully populated and exists on disk. We can now query the database and its contents. The SQL query we will execute fetches the contents of chapter 112 in the English locale (i.e: en):

SELECT qurans.locale,
       chapters.tr_name  AS "chapter (name)",
       chapters.number   AS chapter,
       verses.number     AS verse,
       verses.content
FROM   verses
       INNER JOIN qurans
               ON qurans.id = verses.quran_id
       INNER JOIN chapters
               ON chapters.id = verses.chapter_id
WHERE  qurans.locale = "en"
       AND chapters.number = 112;

The output should look like this:

locale  chapter (name)  chapter  verse  content
------  --------------  -------  -----  -----------------------------------------------------
en      Al-Ikhlas       112      1      Say, ˹O Prophet,˺ “He is Allah—One ˹and Indivisible˺;
en      Al-Ikhlas       112      2      Allah—the Sustainer ˹needed by all˺.
en      Al-Ikhlas       112      3      He has never had offspring, nor was He born.
en      Al-Ikhlas       112      4      And there is none comparable to Him.”

5.2

The next query we will execute demonstrates how to find a particular word or phrase in the English translation of The Qur'an - using the LIKE operator:

SELECT qurans.locale,
       chapters.name   AS "chapter (name)",
       chapters.number AS chapter,
       verses.number   AS verse,
       verses.content
FROM   verses
       INNER JOIN qurans
               ON qurans.id = verses.quran_id
       INNER JOIN chapters
               ON chapters.id = verses.chapter_id
WHERE  qurans.locale = "en"
       AND verses.content LIKE "%reflected light%";

The output should look like this:

locale  chapter (name)  chapter  verse  content
------  --------------  -------  -----  ----------------------------------------------------
en      Jonah           10       5      He is the One Who made the sun a radiant source and
                                        the moon a reflected light, with precisely ordained
                                        phases, so that you may know the number of years and
                                        calculation ˹of time˺. Allah did not create all this
                                        except for a purpose. He makes the signs clear for
                                        people of knowledge.

bin/ directory

The bin/ directory contains scripts that generate the contents of the src/ directory:

• JSON scripts

  • bin/json/pull-arabic
    This script is responsible for populating src/json/ar/.

  • bin/json/pull-english
    This script is responsible for populating src/json/en/.

  • bin/json/pull-farsi
    This script is responsible for populating src/json/fa/.

  • bin/json/pull-portuguese
    This script is responsible for populating src/json/pt/.

  • bin/json/pull-chapter-metadata
    The script is responsible for generating src/json/chapter-metadata.json.

• SQL scripts

  • bin/sql/create-sql-seed-file
    This script creates src/sql/seed.sql - using the contents of src/json/.

Note

By default it is not neccessary to run the scripts mentioned above because the contents of src/ is included in the repository already.

Note

The scripts are written in Ruby v3.1.0+.
The script dependencies can be installed by running the following from the root of the repository:

gem install bundler --no-document
bundle install

Download

For those who don't have access to, or know how to use "git", a zip file of the repository is provided for download: download zip file.

Credit, and thanks

The content of the src/ directory was automatically generated thanks to the following websites:

• https://sacred-texts.com - for the original Arabic.
• https://quran.com - for the English translation.
• https://al-quran.cc - for the Farsi, and Portuguese translations.

License

This software is released into the Public Domain.