Expert: Stephanie Loss - 1/18/2006

Question
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Followup To
Question -
Stephanie;
 When I was in (public) grade school ( 50 years ago ), I was taught that you capitalized the "G" in god when referring to The God, as opposed to  "a" god.  Also HE, Him, His should be capitalized when referring to God.  Has this changed?
         Al

Answer -
   Stephanie;
When I was in (public) grade school ( 50 years ago ), I was taught that you capitalized the "G" in god when referring to The God, as opposed to "a" god. Also HE, Him, His should be capitalized when referring to God. Has this changed?

It depends on what you're writing, and for/to whom you are writing. Those who are religious stick with captializing the first letter of the word that refers to God. Writing stuff for church would be the same.

If you are not religious, and writing to someone else who is not religious, then the capitalization is not necessary.

So, if you feel comfortable with it, do it. It is common enough that those who are not religious will know why you are doing it.

Stephanie;
   I received another reply that does not admit to "options" as does your answer. Is there an "authority" on this?
         Al  

Answer
Stephanie;
  I received another reply that does not admit to "options" as does your answer. Is there an "authority" on this?
         Al

When I wrote my response, I was mainly going on personal experience, but to respond to this question, I decided to get some references. As you can see below, the answer sticks to "Do what you're comfortable with." Unless you're strongly Christian, then the Holy Observer says to captialize anything that might barely refer to God. The first reference is the most helpful, as it comes from a writing manual.


Q. What is the proper pronoun form to use to refer to God? I was taught to capitalize the pronoun 'He' when 'God' was the antecedent. However, I checked a number of standard grammar handbooks and can't find any information on this point. Have the rules changed?

A. Chicago lowercases such pronouns, but it's not wrong to uppercase, especially if you are writing for a religious readership or anyone else who might take lowercasing as a sign of disrespect. In matters of style, in contrast to those of grammar, there are few right or wrong answers. Different houses follow different style guides in order to make their publications consistent.

http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/cmosfaq/cmosfaq.CapitalizationTitles.

Many European languages capitalize nouns and pronouns used to refer to God: Hallowed be Thy name. Some English authors capitalize any word referring to God: the Lamb, the Almighty.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalization

The use of capitalization, as for a proper noun, has persisted to disambiguate the concept of a singular God from pagan deities for which lowercase god has continued to be applied, mirroring the use of Latin deus. Pronouns referring to God are also often capitalized and are traditionally in the masculine gender, i.e. "He", "His" etc. However, in more recent times, some people have referred to God in feminine terms, such as "She" and "Her".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God

Religious Words
The question of whether or not to capitalize religious words is an individual one. SparkNotes capitalizes God but does not capitalize he or his in relation to God.
In Sunday school, the kids study God and His word.
In Sunday school, the kids study God and his word.
http://www.sparknotes.com/writing/style/topic_36.html

http://www.holyobserver.com/detail.php?isu=v01i08&art=caps