[After explaining why a poster didn't capitalize the word "god"]
And you can only wish there is no God. You better start capitalizing it now since you will meet Him one day and He'll probably ask you why you didn't give Him even this smallest respect.
49 comments
It's not your "God" for whom I lack respect, after all, he's just a fictional character. For him I have all the respect a fairy tale character deserves. It's you, your religious pals and your theology for which I have no respect.
Proper nouns are capitalized, names of things are not unless it is the first word of a sentence. The Christian god's name is Jehovah (or Yahweh to some), just as the name the Muslims call their god is Allah. I've always found it curious that Christians find it necessary to capitalize "God" when it really isn't a name.
If there is a god, and he demands that you believe in him or endure eternal torment, it really won't make any difference if the condemned soul capitalized or not, will it?
If I were a grammar nazi, I would point out some rules of English grammar. Nouns which are not normally proper nouns (names) should be capitalized if they are being used as a proper noun.
"My mother lives in a nearby town. I am going to call Mother soon."
So the rule would be, for theist or atheist, that if you are using the word god as if it were a name, then capitalize it. Otherwise don't.
"Biff worships the god of Abraham, Issac and Jacob. He thinks that God will grant him wisdom."
TDR: "am I the only one here who deliberately doesn't use a capital G in god, on principle?"
Nope. I refuse to capitalize that word, and when I'm feeling particularly ornery, I spell it "gawd," especially when referring to the cruel, insane deity depicted in the "wholly babble."
Anyway, it occurs to me that we may have discovered, thanks to biff, the reason why so many of the fundies quoted on here capitalize with wild abandon; they don't really know god or understand its nature any better than anyone else, so they capitalize random words just to try to cover all the bases and save their sorry asses from being barbequed in heckfire.
Actually, Star Cluster, "Allah" comes from "al-ilah," meaning "the deity." It's about as comparable to the English "God," since they both just mean "proper-name-God." Neither Arabic nor Hebrew have capital letters, so capitalization of Jehovah and Allah are not inherant to those languages and the speakers' religions, but rather an Anglicization.
But, since it's the English form to capitalize proper nouns, if Allah is capitalized, so is God. But of course you're not going to get damned if you don't...maybe just poor marks by your English teacher. ;)
Yeah, Dante's Inferno didn't cover that one. All non-capitalizers go to grammar hell.
Nicole, after reading so many of the posts here, it would appear that we *are* in grammar hell!
Yeah, and you better start captializing e. e. cummings, too. He was the father of modern poetry and he will be pissed when you meet him in Heaven and will probably bust on you in innovative experimental verse!
Oh, wait. e. e. cummings doesn't want you to capitalize his name. Nevermind.
I doubt g/God gives a diddly damn if you capitalize his name.
@Dr. Brown
Great Scott!
No need to stoke my ego, thanks.
And, really, who WOULDN'T wish there was a loving sky daddy up there who could give me eternal bliss? I'd rather believe that, but it's better to be in the know and miserable than ignorant and happy.
And im sure Jayzus didn't take english classes, as probably 90% of the population at the time were illiterate.
That, plus the fact that, in Jesus's time, English hadn't been invented yet.
(Just don't tell the KJV-only folks that. They'll be heartbroken.)
God: WHY DID YOU NOT CAPITALIZE MY NAME THAT ONE TIME ON FREE CONSERVATIVES!?!?!?
PErson: Sorry! It was a typo!
God: TO HELL WITH THEE!
yeah. god hates people who don't capitalize.
Okay it's fine to capitalize God when that's used as a proper title but why capitalize pronouns when talking a b out God. That's overkill.
Even if God exist I doubt he cares if you don't vaporize he or him when you write about him.
Confused?
So were we! You can find all of this, and more, on Fundies Say the Darndest Things!
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