One of my very first posts on this blog was a look at the problem in Malaysia of how the countries Christians are not allowed to refer to God as Allah, which is Malay for God.
Well I have read this evening that the Malaysian authorities have seized 10,000 Bibles in Malay which use the word Allah, for God.
At the root of this problem is language and the fact of the matter is, the only word for God in Malay is Allah, yes the word comes from Arabic, but Arabic like Latin spread far and wide and its influence can be heard in languages all over the world.
Take Maltese, the native language of Malta, the island is almost entirely Catholic, but the language is one descended from the Arabic which was spoken in Southern Italy, and as such the word for God in Maltese, is Alla. Having spoken to a Maltese friend about this, they explained that it would be impossible to change the name of Alla to God because the whole identity of God in their language is simply tied into the word Alla.
I suppose it would be like trying to change the way Christians in the English speaking world refers to God, perhaps we could call him Bob from now on! It wouldn’t work would it? A prayer to All-Mighty Bob is not the same as a prayer to All-Mighty God.
Now back to Malaysia, but a big part of the problem is that some people think that Christians are using the word Allah, to confuse Muslims and try and get them to convert to Christianity. There seems to be this whole issue of a belief that there is more than one God, one for Christians, and one for Muslims.
Anyway, I have a point to make and that point is that there can only be one God, and it really doesn’t matter what we call him, God, Allah, Nirankar, Bhagwan, Yahweh, Shangdi, Tengri, Ōrmazd or even Bob, at the end of the day we are all worshiping the same Supreme Being, so lets not get petty and fight over language.
God Bless
Michael
