Why do we capitalize pronouns related to God? For that matter, I find it sort of odd that His name is a proper noun when capitalized, and just a normal noun when lower case. (Kind of like Polish and polish.)
My question, I guess, is three-fold.
1: Why do we capitalize His pronouns?
2: Is English the only language where we do this?
3: Do we do this for all gods, or just Christianity?
Not everyone does this. Obviously, it’s done out of respect. It might be mentioned as well that not that long ago all nouns were capitalized in English.
Also, some biblical verses might be misunderstood otherwise – which male pronouns refer to God is of some importance.
For example, 1 Peter 2:13-14 in the KJV –
The phrase “sent by him” might make it sound as if the governors are being sent by God to punish people – yet the translator makes it clear by not capitalizing “him” that it refers to those sent by the governor (e.g. cops).
Other translations besides the KJV do not capitalize Him when refering to God and as such the meaning of this passage becomes less clear.
No. German capitalizes all nouns AFAIK.
This one I don’t know. I doubt it but I don’t know.
(I might mention the British still do this for Kings and Queens. You never see “her royal majesty” – it is always “Her Royal Majesty.”)
The thing is that hey aren’t really pronouns. A pronoun is a “temp” noun that can represent different nouns depending on what’s needed. “He” refers to God, and God only.
Yes, the names of other deities are capitalized in English.
Okay, I understand why capitalization of God’s pronouns occurred in the bible (thanks JM) but you’re saying that “not that long ago all nouns were capitalized in English” kind of confuses me. How long ago was “not that long ago”? And do you really mean all nouns? That seems like an awful lot of capitals.
As to The Ryan’s post, I disagree. “He” is a pronoun. It’s not in the dictionary as an alternate name for the Christian god. Same with Him, His, etcetera. I can see where capitalizing would signify respect, too, but that doesn’t mean that everywhere I see a capitalized masculine pronoun that it refers to your god.
As to 9I’s post, I know that the NAMES of other dieties are capitolized in English, but are their pronouns?
I don’t think it’s exactly a matter of English. I doubt that a member of a completely different religion, say Buddhism ,writing about the Christian God, would necessarily capitalize the pronouns, any more than Christians commonly capitalize the pronouns when writing about the Greek or Roman gods. Names of religions (Judaism,Buddhism) ,the names for their members (Wiccans,Catholics) ,and the names of gods (God (in some religions) ,Zeus) are generally capitalized regardless of the writer’s beliefs. Come to think of it, I doubt a Jewish writer would capitalize pronouns referring to Jesus, but Christians certainly do.
Well, prior to Shakespeare I imagine. You might want to start another GQ thread on that for a better answer. And as late as the 1840 in Britain, “big concepts” were still capitalized – I read a quote from Thomas Carlyle last night capitalizing “Common-Sense” for no apparently good reason. I doubt people would capitalize that today.
Whoops. Sorry about that; I goofed.
Incidentally, I love getting email from non-native English speakers who are used to capitalizing “You” at all times in writing… it makes me feel so omnipotent.
Are you saying that if someone wrote “I’m just trying to do His work”, you would not know what he was talking about?
The pronouns used with reference to the Christian God are capitalized by believers for two reasons:
Reason #2 might call for a brief explanation. Say you’re recounting a conversation between Moses and God. It helps if you can write that he asked this, and He said that, and have the customary capitalization usage distinguish between him and Him. (Basically what TheRyan said, but spelled out a bit more.)
As for whether one capitalizes the names of other gods, I suppose that would depend on the individual and his belief system. I know that traditionally Jews speaking in English of their deity with the four-letter unpronounceable all-consonant name (He’s mine too) use G-d to represent it, again out of respect. And in speech a Muslim is normally inclined to say God/Allah, “Blessed be He” with that short clause always following the name, again effectively as a mark of respect.
Not everyone capitalizes his pronouns. For me as a non-believer to do it would be as silly as if I wrote, “Speaking of Zeus, did you know His favorite horse was…”
Actually, this fad is making quite the comeback, though it generally has more of a sarcastic tone when used now.
The version I have of Gulliver’s Travels also capitalizes all nouns.
As for why Christians Capitalize God, lord, and pronouns referring to Him - out of respect, far as I know.
And the names of other deities are capitalized inasmuch as they are names. Yahweh, Allâh, Zeus, Baal, whatever.
Well I guess my confusion stems from the fact that I was under the misconception that it was grammatically correct to capitalize God’s pronouns, but not other gods’. From what TheRyan and others are saying, it seems that it’s customary for believers as a sign of respect, but not grammatically necessary. I appreciate the enlightenment.
TheRyan wrote:
“Are you saying that if someone wrote “I’m just trying to do His work”, you would not know what he was talking about?”
In response, I say that I would need to know your religious beliefs before I knew who He was, unless the sentence was part of a larger conversation involving a particular god, just as I would wonder about any unspecified pronoun.
tshirts wrote:
"Not everyone capitalizes his pronouns. For me as a non-believer to do it would be as silly as if I wrote, ‘Speaking of Zeus, did you know His favorite horse was…’ "
So who was Zeus’ favorite horse?
I had always understood that the capitalization was used for any pronoun or title referring to the Supreme Being of any belief system (or at least, any belief system which has a Supreme Being). Hence, for instance, the Invisible Pink Unicorn would properly be referred to as She, not as she.
I had the impression that in some English translations of the Bible, God is sometimes referred to as the LORD (“ord” being small caps), and this indicates the occurance of “YHWH” in the original Hebrew text. Is this true?
Also, for orthodox Jews, is the appropriate pronoun for G-d look like “H-m”?
Zarathustra