I was reading this thread about the formal and informal in Spanish and started to wonder about the way god is addressed.
In most languages I know he is addressed using the informal: du, tu, thou. In Dutch he is addressed in the formal: U (it’s even capitalised just for him). I couldn’t think of any other languages in which god was addressed using the informal. Are there others?
In Polish, God is generally referred to with the honorific “Pan,” which means “sir” or “mister.” (That’s the way you distinguish informal “you,” ty, from formal “you,” Pan or Pani [“Sir” or “Miss/Ma’am”], in Polish.)
Actually, now that I think of it, “The Lord’s Prayer” in Polish uses the informal. But that may be because the familiar form of “you” was used in the original prayer. In mass, the formal is used, and God is usually addressed as “Pan Bóg,” meaning something like “Sir God” or “Mr. God.” (Same type of construction exists in Hungarian.) I’m now unsure how people address God in their private prayers, though. I grew up with Polish as my first language (along with English), and my instinct would be to use the formal as a sign of respect. That said, I was never formally taught Polish or how to pray in Polish, so what I know is from my family and attending Polish mass as a kid.
Yeah I just realised I don’t know for Romanian. Somehow I know for the other languages I speak, but I guess I’ve never done anything religious in Romania.
In English at least, “thee”, “thou” and etc. were used in the King James Bible when God spoke to man. This was the proper way at the time, similar to how a noble or royal would speak to a commoner.
As time went on, the informal thees and thous were stripped out of the everyday language, but they were still there in the bible, giving them a “holy” or “sacred” feel. So they basically changed meaning 180 degrees to be extremely respectful and formal when talking to God.
Did the other “informal god” languages take this route? Or was there some other reason to address God informally?
Somehow I scanned over your first sentence and read it as ‘Romulan.’ 
I even wondered what god Romulans believe in.
In Korean he is rarely if ever referred to in the second person. In the Lord’s prayer, for example, he is always referred to as father. Hallowed be our father’s name, our father’s kingdom come, our father’s will be done, etc.
I should clarify this. I don’t know if the original text or the Latin text of the Lord’s Prayer used the familiar form or not, but if it did, that’s one reason why it might be so in Polish.
In French, many prayers (including the Pater Noster) use the informal. However, no one will object if someone opts to write a prayer using the formal tone: I doubt that people would really pay attention to this.
As far as German is concerned, God is addressed with »du« instead of the formal “sie”. Sometimes I wondered why that is.
Perhaps because the relationship to God is a very deep, intimate one. Maybe there is a linguistic explanation.
And something about this is strange: In German, using the colloquial “du” in relation to an adult person you don’t personally know is seen as rude, condescending or even insulting, at least among older folks (in the past, if you addressed a cop this way, you could be charged).
With regards to God, it’s the other way round: using the pronoun “sie” (which in general is more formal) for God could be seen as mocking, frivolous or even blasphemous. “Du” is the only correct form.
Maybe the implication is that God is someone you should personally know?
Something along that line. It transcends any type of relationship people have with each other.
Always amusing to note that, when Darth Vader asks “What is thy bidding,” he’s speaking in the familiar, not the respectful formal that is implied by the bent knee.
As a native speaker, I would find it odd if someone referred to the Christian god with formal pronouns, but apparently this is very recent, dating to Vatican II (1965). Prior to this, the Pater Noster used formal pronouns. Nowadays, in liturgy as in common speech, only Mary is addressed with vous.
In Japanese, Christians pray to god using honorific expressions reserved for deities, buddhas or emperors. For instance, the Catholic Pater Noster starts with:
天におられるわたしたちの父よ、
み名が聖とされますように。
み国が来ますように。
The honorific in question is the み (mi) before 名 (name) and 国 (kingdom/country).
However, this is not universal among Christian groups. For instance, some churches, notably orthodox ones, use the expression 汝 or 爾 (nanji), which used to be a second-person pronoun used to refer to someone of equal or inferior social rank. Nowadays, this word is only used in religious (Christian) contexts.
Yes, as to the use, as in Martin Buber’s I and Thou, which unfortunately takes on the “wrong,” stilted (now) “holy, respectful” form of “you” in English, when in fact it is a call for the intimacy in the relationship.
The thee and thou business is critical in establishing relationships in Shakespeare, but is often overlooked.
In Latin, there is no formal / informal distinction between tu & vos, only singular and plural. The formal / informal thing arises later. So the Vulgate Bible would use tu for God because that’s the only thing that makes sense for a single God in Latin.
I found the Romanian, looks like that’s informal too:
Beginning of the Lord’d Prayer:
Tatăl nostru care eşti în ceruri,
sfinţească-se numele Tău,
(examples of informal bolded)
I wouldn’t know if that’s consistent, especially as jovan mentioned that it changed over time in French.
So it still seems it’s rather strange that Dutch is (maybe?) among the few languages that addresses god in the formal, despite having formal and informal pronouns. I wondered if it’s Calvinism, but I think the Dutch Catholics do it too.
In Arabic, there is no T/V (tu vs. vous sort of distinction). The Arab commoner addressing the king says “anta” which is second person singular. The second-person plural is only used when actually addressing a plural number of people.
In Hindi and Urdu, the informal 2nd-person singular tu is used for praying to God. Hindi tu is so informal that it’s almost never used in everyday life outside of prayer. Even to family members the plural tum is used, and tu used to address a person would probably be taken as insulting. It’s like the stage English was at in the 18th century or so, when thou had fallen out of everyday use except for talking to God, but people still knew what it meant, and using it toward a person would have been felt to be extremely informal or insulting.
The really formal pronoun in Hindi and Urdu is ap, which derives from Sanskrit atma ‘soul’, but I’ve never heard ap used in prayer!
Nowadays, nobody except scholars knows what thou actually means any more, and it’s even mistaken for formality—the very opposite of what it means, ironically.
The T/V distinction is one of distance between the speakers, and if you said the formal vous to your best bud, it would sound very weird to suddenly throw a big wallop of distancing into the relationship. God is supposed to be your best bud, at least in prayer.
“Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name…”
At least in that case in the KJV, man is speaking to God, not the other way around. By your logic, shouldn’t “your” have been used?