الله
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Arabic
Etymology
From the root ء ل ه (ʔ-l-h). Widely theorized to be a contraction of الٱِلٰه (al-ilāh, “God”), from الإلٰه (al-ʔilāh, “the deity”) with loss of initial hamza after the definite article ال (al-). Others suggest it is a variant spelling of the more ancient ألّٰه (allāh), the extra ل (l) serving as an emphatic marker to emphasize distinction, first attested in the Mecca and Taif region, and later in the Quran. Both proposed roots were current in pre-Islamic usage, particularly الإلٰه (al-ilāh) in Nabataean macaronic Arabic-Aramaic usage from which the singular use has presumably spread. Ultimately from Proto-Semitic *ʔil-. Compare Classical Syriac ܐܲܠܵܗ (ʾalāh), Aramaic אֱלָהָ (ʾelāh), Hebrew אֱלוֹהַּ (ʾelōah), and Old South Arabian 𐩱𐩡𐩠 (ʾlh).
Pronunciation
Proper noun
اللّٰه • (allāh) m
- (monotheism) God
- 609–632 CE, Qur'an, 112:1-4:
- قُلْ هُوَ ٱللّٰهُ أَحَدٌ ٱللّٰهُ ٱلصَّمَدُ لَمْ يَلِدْ وَلَمْ يُولَدْ وَلَمْ يَكُنْ لَهُ كُفُوًا أَحَدٌ
- qul huwa llāhu ʔaḥadun llāhu ṣ-ṣamadu lam yalid wa-lam yūlad wa-lam yakun lahu kufuwan ʔaḥadun
- Say, “He is God, [who is] One, God, the Eternal Refuge. He neither begets nor is born, nor is there to Him any equivalent.”
- 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, John 3:16:
- لِأَنَّهُ هٰكَذَا أَحَبَّ ٱللهُ ٱلْعَالَمَ حَتَّى بَذَلَ ٱبْنَهُ ٱلْوَحِيدَ، لِكَيْ لَا يَهْلِكَ كُلُّ مَنْ يُؤْمِنُ بِهِ، بَلْ يَكُونُ لَهُ الْحَيَاةُ ٱلْأَبَدِيَّةُ.
- For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.
- 1865 CE, Bible (SVD), Gospel of John, 11:4:
- فَلَمَّا سَمِعَ يَسُوعُ قَالَ: هٰذَا ٱلْمَرَضُ لَيْسَ لِلْمَوْتِ بَلْ لِأَجْلِ مَجْدِ اللّٰهِ لِيَتَمَجَّدَ ٱبْنُ اللّٰهِ بِهِ.
- fa-lammā samiʕa yasūʕu qāla: hāḏā l-maraḍu laysa li-l-mawti bal li-ʔajli majdi llāhi li-yatamajjada bnu llāhi bihi.
- When Jesus heard it, he said: This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God might be glorified thereby.
Usage notes
- In Islamic contexts, this word may alternatively be translated into English as Allah. Note, however, that the Arabic word is just as neutral and general as English God, and does not express any particularly Islamic notion at all. الله (allāh) is the word used by Christians, Jews, and other monotheists to describe the God of their own religions, and is cognate to the words used in Hebrew and Syriac. The Jewish sage Saadia Gaon even used الله (allāh) to translate the Tetragrammaton in his translation of the Torah.
Declension
Derived terms
- اللَّٰهُمَّ (allāhumma, “God; O God”)
- اللّٰهُ أَكْبَرُ (allāhu ʔakbaru, “God is greater”)
- بِسْمِ ٱللّٰهِ (bi-smi llāhi, “in the name of God”)
- بِسْمِ ٱللَّٰهِ ٱلرَّحْمَٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ (bismi llāhi r-raḥmāni r-raḥīmi)
- إِنْ شَاءَ ٱللّٰهُ (ʔin šāʔa llāhu, “if God wills”)
- سُبْحَانَ ٱللّٰهِ (subḥāna llāhi, “glory be to God”)
- أَسْتَغْفِرُ ٱللّٰهَ (ʔastaḡfiru llāha, “I seek forgiveness from God”)
- ٱلْحَمْدُ لِلَّٰهِ (l-ḥamdu lillāhi, “all praise is for God”)
- آيَةُ الله (ʔāyatu llāh, “Ayatollah, sign of God”)
Descendants
Borrowings:
- → Adyghe: Алахь (Alaḥ)
- → Afrikaans: Allah
- → Albanian: Allah, Allahu
- → Amharic: አላህ (ʾälah)
- → Armenian: Ալլահ (Allah)
- → Assamese: আল্লাহ (allah)
- → Avar: Аллагь (Allah)
- → Azerbaijani: Allah
- → Bashkir: Алла (Alla)
- → Belarusian: Алах (Alax)
- → Bengali: আল্লাহ (allah)
- → Bulgarian: Аллах (Allah)
- → Burmese: အလ္လာဟ် (allah)
- → Catalan: Al·là
- → Central Kurdish: ئەڵڵا (elllla)
- → Chechen: Аллахӏ (Allah)
- → Chinese:
- → Crimean Tatar: Alla
- → Czech: Alláh
- → Danish: Allah
- → Dhivehi: އައްލާހު (allāhu)
- → English: Allah
- → Estonian: Allah
- → Finnish: Allah
- → Galician: Alá
- → Georgian: ალაჰი (alahi)
- → German: Allah
- → German Low German: Allah
- → Greek: Αλλάχ (Allách)
- → Gujarati: અલ્લાહ (allāh)
- → Hausa: Allah
- → Hebrew: אללה (allá)
- → Hindi: अल्लाह (allāh)
- → Hungarian: Allah
- → Indonesian: Allah
- → Irish: Allah
- → Japanese: アッラーフ (Arrāfu)
- → Javanese: ꦄꦭ꧀ꦭꦃ (allah)
- → Kannada: ಅಲ್ಲಾಹ (allāha)
- → Karaim: аллахъ (allax)
- → Kazakh: Аллаһ (Allah)
- → Khmer: អាឡា (ʼaalaa)
- → Korean: 알라 (Alla)
- → Kumyk: Аллагь (Allah)
- → Kyrgyz: Алла (Alla), Аллах (Allah)
- → Lao: ອັນເລາະ (ʼan lǫ)
- → Latvian: Allāhs
- → Lezgi: Аллагь (Allah)
- → Lithuanian: Alachas
- → Macedonian: Алах (Alah)
- → Malay: Allah
- → Malayalam: അല്ലാഹു (allāhu)
- → Marathi: अल्लाह (allāh)
- → Mongolian: Аллах (Allax)
- → Northern Kurdish: Ellah
- → Norwegian: Allah
- → Odia: ଅଲ୍ଲାହ (ôllahô)
- → Ottoman Turkish: الله (Allâh)
- Turkish: Allah
- → Pashto: الله (əllɑ)
- → Persian: الله (allâh)
- → Polish: Allach, Allah, Ałłach
- → Portuguese: Alá
- Punjabi:
- → Romanian: Allah
- → Russian: Аллах (Allax)
- → Sanskrit: अल्लाह् (allāh)
- → Serbo-Croatian:
- → Sinhalese: අල්ලාහ් (allāh)
- → Slovak: Alah
- → Slovene: Alah
- → Somali: Allaah
- → Spanish: Alá
- → Classical Syriac: ܐܠܠܐ / ܐܠܠܘ (allāh / allā) (chiefly Garshuni)
- → Tajik: Оллоҳ (Olloh)
- → Tamil: அல்லாஹ் (allāh)
- → Tatar: Аллах (Allax)
- → Telugu: అల్లాహ్ (allāh)
- → Thai: อัลลอฮ์ (an-lɔɔ)
- → Tibetan: ཨ་ལ (a la)
- → Tigrinya: አላህ (ʾälah)
- → Turkmen: Allah
- → Ukrainian: Аллах (Allax)
- → Urdu: اللہ (allāh)
- → Urum: аллах (allah)
- → Uyghur: ئاللاھ (allah)
- → Uzbek: Alloh
- → Vietnamese: A-la
- → Yakut: Аллаах (Allaaq)
- → Yiddish: אַלאַ (ala)
- → Yoruba: Allah
- → Zazaki: Allah, Alla
From يَا اللّٰه (yā llāh, “O God”): (see also the descendants at يَاٱللَّٰه (yāllāh))
References
- Jeffery, Arthur (1938) “اَللّٰه”, in The Foreign Vocabulary of the Qurʾān (Gaekwad’s Oriental Series; 79), Baroda: Oriental Institute, page 66
- Nehmé, Laïla (2017) “New dated inscriptions (Nabataean and pre-Islamic Arabic) from a site near al-Jawf, ancient Dūmah, Saudi Arabia”, in Arabian Epigraphic Notes, volume 3, pages 121–164
- Wehr, Hans (1979) “ءله”, in J. Milton Cowan, editor, A Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic, 4th edition, Ithaca, NY: Spoken Language Services, →ISBN
Anagrams
Hijazi Arabic
Pronunciation 1
- IPA(key): /aɫ.ɫaː(h)/
Pronunciation 2
- IPA(key): /aɫ.ɫa(h)/
Usage notes
The pronunciation with the final long vowel is used as an interjection to something beautiful and exciting, while the pronunciation with the short vowel is used as an interjection to something shocking
Khalaj
Declension
singular | |
---|---|
nominative | الله |
genitive | اللهؽݧ |
dative | اللهقا |
definite accusative | اللهؽ |
locative | اللهچا |
ablative | اللهدا |
instrumental | اللهلا |
equative | اللهوارا |
North Levantine Arabic
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /ˈʔɑlˤlˤɑ/
Proper noun
الله • (ʾAlla) m
- (monotheism) God
- هوه ملحد، ما بيآمن بشي اسمو الله
- Huwi mulḥid, ma biʾāmin bi-ši ismu Alla.
- He’s an atheist, he doesn’t believe in such a thing as God.
Ottoman Turkish
Etymology
Borrowed from Arabic اللّٰه (allāh); ultimately from Proto-Semitic *ʾil-.
Descendants
- Turkish: Allah
See also
- تكری (tañrı)
Persian
Dari | الله |
---|---|
Iranian Persian | |
Tajik | Оллоҳ |
Etymology
Borrowed from Arabic اَللّٰه (allāh); ultimately from Proto-Semitic *ʾil-.
Pronunciation
- (Classical Persian) IPA(key): [ʔal.ˈlɑːh]
- (Dari, formal) IPA(key): [ʔäl.lɑ́ːʱ]
- (Kabuli) IPA(key): [ʔäl.lɑ́ː]
- (Hazaragi) IPA(key): [ʔäl.lɔ́ː]
- (Iran, formal) IPA(key): [ʔæl.lɒ́ːʰ]
- (Tajik, formal) IPA(key): [ʔɔl.lɔ́ʱ]
Readings | |
---|---|
Classical reading? | allāh |
Dari reading? | allāh |
Iranian reading? | allâh |
Tajik reading? | olloh |
See also
- خُدا (xodâ)