Talk:Takbir

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Contents

[edit] site by the name of allahuakbar

It has nothing to do with the article or the world. Wikipedia isn't a place to advertise. Okrainets

[edit] early discussions

Libyan anthem as the only one not to mention the country? The Star-Spangled Banner doesn't mention the U.S., at least not by name. --Dante Alighieri | Talk 18:57, Apr 26, 2004 (UTC)

Also true about the swedish anthem Du gamla, Du fria...

Nope. It's right there in the fourth verse. Nobody ever sings that many, however...

Elative doesn't seem to mean what this article claims it means. Maybe whoever added it meant superlative? - Gwalla 18:16, Apr 30, 2004 (UTC)

No, it seems OK to me. From that article: form of an adjective or adverb that indicates a global maximum, e.g. "the most beautiful woman on earth". –Hajor
Ah, I missed that. Whoops! Thanks. - Gwalla 01:01, May 1, 2004 (UTC)
the article says correctly that it's an elative (not a comparative). Yet the translation "God is greater" suggests that the phrase is unfinished. It is not: the elative may be a comparative, if a comparandum follows. If none follows, it's simply the elative, meaning "very great". think the proper translation should just be "God is very great", or even "God is great" (I imagine that *"Allahu kabir" would be quite blasphemous compared to it, translating to something like "God is quite great", so there is really no other way of saying "God is great"). dab 11:04, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Real Audio

Can we get an open source sound clip for this? Real Audio sucks. Thanks, Mark Richards 21:15, 1 Jun 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Missing critical word

The opening phrase "Allahu Akbar (Arabic: الله) is" seems to me to be missing the central word of the entire article -- namely the "Allahu" (in the Arabic)!? To clarify, shouldn't it say: "Allahu Akbar (Arabic: الله أَكْبَر) is" ?

Just for reference, it is " أَكْبَر " which is "akbar" and " الله " which is "Allah," not the reverse.

[edit] Iranian Flag

The Iranian flag also appears to have the phrase Allahu Akbar as well. The 'hu' part is a mix of the Arabic 'ha' which is on the flag and a part of the word "Allah" and the letter 'wow' which, like many vowels, is understood and omitted from regular Arabic script. OneGuy removed it from the article, but I am going to reinstate it as per my argument here. If I am mistaken, please feel free to correct me. mr100percent 3:23, 26 Feb 2005 (EST)

The same claim is made on our own Flag of Iran, on fotw.net, and in a "Flags of the world"-type book I just went downstairs to check. –Hajor 21:14, 26 Feb 2005 (UTC)
The "u" vowel is the actually the nominative case vowel (i.e. i`rab), which often is not pronounced in modern pronunciations of Arabic, but is in this fixed phrase. AnonMoos 19:31, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Although, there is no evidence for what?

Someone added "Although, there is no evidence in either the authentic Quran and Hadith for this." to the end of "The actual title of this phrase is takbīr (تَكْبِير), while the phrase itself is "Allahu Akbar". In the Islamic world, instead of applause, often someone will yell "takbīr" and the crowd will respond "Allahu Akbar" in chorus."

I don't understand the purpose or what part of the preceeding sentence they are calling into question. Does the Quran not mention the word "takbir" or that the shout of "takbir" will be followed by "allahu akbar" instead of applause? The practice seems to be a contemporary practice or at least a practice that would not be prescribed in the Quran or Hadith. The test of authenticity of the practice is not the Quran, but whether or not it actually happens.

I'm removing the bothersome phrase as an ambiguous challenge.

JJLatWiki 16:08, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] NPOV Discussion

This article merits some mention of the use of the term "Allau Akbar" by terrorists, particularly suicide bombers before they carry out their missions. While I agree that obviously most Muslims are law-abiding, peace loving people/citizens, there has been numerous documentation, including the videos of the Iraq beheadings where this phrase is shouted over and over again right before the terrorist acts are carried out. The article deserves a neutral, fact based statement to that effect. (This unsigned comment left by 68.194.26.4 (talk) 00:14, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

I moved this latest addition to the talk page to the bottom, where new material is expected and easier to find.
Since this comment is from the user who slapped the POV tag on the page, I will assume this paragraph above is why he did so. I don't argree with his argument above - that connection doesn't belong in this entry in my opinion, and it *appears* to be pushing a anti-Muslim POV. Regardless of how one feels on that issue, the POV tag is not applicable here, and I'm removing it. --Krich (talk) 19:49, 26 December 2005 (UTC)
I'm curious as to why you think so? Were they to be saying "thank God" or something else similar which is common to English speech I doubt the same point of view would arise with regard to the English phrase in an English language article. Likewise, this point of view would never arise in an Arabic language article because the incredibly broad commonality of the phrase is better known to Arabic speakers. As such, a statement such as you are suggesting is really not capeable of being neutral for the simple fact that making it implies a degree of significance which doesn't really exist. --66.216.160.9 11:09, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

Actually if I could find the original citation I'd add a section about the phrase's perception in Western media. Very shortly after 9/11 a major United States network broadcast a documentary about terrorism where one scene featured a group of men in a mosque saying "Allahu akbar" while a voiceover spoke about Muslim terrorists. I actually wrote to the network to complain (I think it was NBC). Imagine the equivalent: an Arabic language documentary editorializing about Christian terrorism while showing a Pentecostal religious service as the congregation calls out, "Praise the Lord!" This sort of presentation is distorted and inflammatory. Durova 04:47, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

I think something should be mentioned about the phrase stating that most westerners who know about the takbir know it only in the context of terrorism (suicide bombers saying it, its usage in militant execution videos, etc.) Then it should be noted right after that, that the phrase is so commonly used by Muslims, the vast majority of whom are peaceful, that any suggested connotations regarding terrorism are ridiculous. -- unsigned comment by anonymous IP 129.2.213.93 22:12, 16 September 2006
It's a traditional battle-cry, and its use can be perceived as positive or negative depending on whether you support or oppose the group using it as a battle-cry. We can clarify that it's a traditional battle-cry (used in many contexts where "Praise the Lord" would not normally be used by Christians), but I don't know that it really has any special association with terrorism. AnonMoos 14:18, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Akbar versus Azam

On the Talk:Bahá'u'lláh's family page (in the last section called Titles) we are having a fierce debate on the relative meanings of Ghusn-i-Azam versus Ghusn-i-Akbar. I'm claiming they mean essentially the same thing, or at least that Akbar means "Greatest" not "Greater" or even "Great" in this context. It seems your page here is also stating that Akbar means "Greatest" (the suprelative form) and not merely "Great-er" or "Great". If anyone want to come over to my page and make it clear, that would be great. Wjhonson 07:10, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Definitions

I'm updating a few of the definitions. Here are sources. I used two dictionaries:

  1. Dr. Rohi Baalbaki (1995). Al-Mawrid, 7th, DAR EL-ILM LILMALAYIN, Beirut. 
  2. F. Steingass PhD, University of Munich (1970). Persian-English Dictionary, Including the Arabic words and phrases to be met with in literature.. Librairie Du Liban, Beirut. 

Here is the root word:

  1. Kabír: Great, big, large, sizeable, bulky, huge, senior...
  2. Kabír: Great, large, bulky, immense, heavy, serious, senior, elder...

And here is Akbar:

  1. Akbar: Greater, bigger, larger, major, senior, superior.
  2. Akbar: Greater, greatest.

Cuñado - Talk 19:45, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Origin

Does this phrase come from Muhammad time? Is it enshrined in the Quran?

I think no.. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 85.107.249.39 (talk) 11:10, 16 December 2006 (UTC).
According to my Qur'anic lexicon, both the word takbiir and forms of the associated "Stem II" finite verb (kabbara / yukabbiru) are found in the Qur'an. AnonMoos 19:38, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] What about other religions..

What about other religion? what do they say? Do they have such phrases?? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 85.107.249.39 (talk) 11:08, 16 December 2006 (UTC).

There are somewhat similar phrases in some cases (such as "Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition", but none with the exact same range of use and connotations that I'm aware of, in Christianity at least. Medieval Christians would generally call out the name of their army's patron saint as a battle-cry (so Englishman would say "By St. George!", or something like that). AnonMoos
Is the Takbir mainly used as a warcry? Otherwise, "God almighty!" might be a good Christian equivalent to "God is great!". gigantibyte —Preceding comment was added at 15:56, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
It's used in a variety of contexts, but I don't see how it's a very close analogy to "God almighty!" -- AnonMoos (talk) 17:44, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Straight from Wiktionary: "Adjective, almighty, 1. Unlimited in might; omnipotent; all-powerful; irresistible." This is what I always understood Muslims meant when they uttered "God is great". "Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition" may be an analogy at times of war, but not for everyday use. - gigantibyte
Yes, the English phrase "Almighty God" has a similar lexical denotation to the Arabic phrase "Allahu Akbar", but "Almighty God!" (as an interjection with an exclamation point) is not really used in the same range of social contexts as "Allahu Akbar" is by Muslims (not in any English-speaking Christian community that I know about, anyway). As an attempt at an all-round general purpose functional equivalent, "Praise the Lord!" might be better (as discsussed above on this page). AnonMoos (talk) 22:55, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Duck And Cover?

In the opening paragraph the article cites; "This is usually yelled by Muslim suicide bombers. If an Arab yells this, the correct action is to duck and cover." -- User:Dangersteve

This would appear to me to be a flippant comment. Is it relevant?

This article is often vandalized... AnonMoos 11:29, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "Western infamy"

"the Western infamy originates particularly from beheading videos"

I'd say that the "Western infamy" is actually much-much older, going back especially to the Turkish onslaught on Europe in the 14th-17th centuries, where "Allahu Akbar" was of course a regular battle cry of the Turkish troops. Maybe the article could include some historical background material that goes beyond current news about terrorism and beheading videos? Lumendelumine 13:13, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Takbir or Takbeer

The title of this article is "Takbir" but the word is spelled "Takbeer" in the article itself. Understanding the difficulties of anglicizing words in other languages, is "Takbeer" the preferred spelling? If so, I suggest the article be moved to "Takbeer" with a redirection of "Takbir" to "Takbeer". Truthanado 15:32, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Transliterating تكبير into the Latin alphabet, a scholarly transliteration would be takbīr (with long vowel symbol), while omitting the scholarly diacritic gives takbir. "Takbeer" is an informal journalistic-type transcription, which should not be used as the main transcription in this article. AnonMoos 15:41, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Westerners?

"The term has gained infamy in the eyes of Westerners who view it as mainly a battle cry; the current Western perception is particularly influenced by the use of the phrase in beheading videos (AP 2006) and other militant acts - the more peaceful meanings of the term are rarely shown by the media."

This part bothers me a lot. I am an agnostic swede (and thus a westerner,) and I doubt anyone I know primarily view it as a battle cry. Secondly, OUR media has not portrayed it in any special way in my opinion. So, to put it bluntly, I think the article confuses "westerner" with "american".81.235.136.245 (talk) 00:53, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

First off, it is actually used as a literal battle-cry, currently and historically. Secondly, there are a lot of people who never heard the phrase until they encountered it in a terrorist context. You may think it's unfortunare, but it's true... AnonMoos (talk) 05:29, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
true or not, it needs to be attributed to a reliable source. Replace Westerners with Mid-Westerners perhaps? Not all "Westerners" are uneducated couch potatoes hooked on Fox TV. dab (𒁳) 06:12, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Dbachmann, I respect the depth of your knowledge on many issues, but unfortunately you seem to very significantly overestimate the average depth of knowledge of Arabic-language catch phrases on the part of non-Muslims living in countries where Muslims are only a small minority of the overall population. Furthermore, I don't think that smug smarmy snide sneering remarks directed at alleged ignorant Americans or alleged ignorant midwestern "couch potatoes" accomplish anything whatsoever constructive in improving this article. AnonMoos (talk) 07:19, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
The problem is not that I think its unfourtunate, the problem is that the article actually says that I am one of those people. This means that I know that this wording is incorrect, making this as big a factual error as saying the earth is flat to someone who is in orbit. I don't think its wrong to mention this, I just think we need to stay factual. There has to be some reliable source which mentions "allahu akbar" being seen by many as simply a battle cry. There also seems to be a small debate among muslims on the internet on how some muslims themselves use this mostly as a battle cry, and wether this is good or not. So I think there's room for this part to expand from just making a generalized claim about westerners to actually making some analyzis on how the word is used and percieved by different people.81.235.136.245 (talk) 14:30, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
OK, I've just now added the word "some" to avoid making any universalist claim -- I think the word "some" or "many" was previously in the article, but it apparently got dropped somewhere along the way. And the phrase "battle-cry" in that particular location in this article is something of a euphemism -- people were editing this article to define Allahu Akbar as a "terrorist slogan" or similar, so in a (partially successful) attempt to head off an edit war between the Islam haters and Islam defenders I put in the little bit about the battle-cry there (since it's historically well-established that Allahu Akbar has in fact been used as a battle-cry). If you think you have a clearer way of phrasing things, then by all means propose it here -- but without removing mention of the indisputable fact that many people first encountered the original Arabic-language phrase Allahu Akbar in a terrorist context (as you can relatively easily see by looking at various right-wing blog sites...). AnonMoos (talk) 17:56, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
P.S. Overlooked the fact that all this is partially documented in section #NPOV Discussion directly above. AnonMoos (talk) 23:01, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Certainly this article can't be considered complete without some mention of the interpretation of this phrase in the western world vis-a-vis muslim terrorists.

[edit] Claim: "Allah can't be translated"

Dear Mussav, you may be an extremely pious Muslim, but if your skills in Arabic linguistics and grammatical analysis are weak, then all the piety in the world won't necessarily help you to usefully edit article "Takbir" (or the related section in the Flag of Iraq article). Furthermore, your idea that what is worshipped in Islam is completely different and separate from what is worshipped in other religions does not appear to be shared by many of your fellow Muslims, who have no hesitation in translating الله into other languages with the word which is normally used to refer to the monotheistic divinity in each language (in English, this word is "God" with a capital G). Not to mention that Arabic-speaking Muslims normally have no problem with Arabic-speaking Christians referring to what they worship by means of the word الله also. When the Malaysian government recently tried to force Malaysian Christians to avoid referring to the Christian God as "Allah" in print publications, this measure received very little support even within Malaysia, and the government soon had to back down. So it's inappropriate for you to edit Wikipedia to make it conform to your own personal viewpoint, which seems to be a minority viewpoint among Muslims... AnonMoos (talk) 05:42, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

There is Shadda on the 2nd L (الله), you can't dived Allah name to 2 words. If you dived the word, it will be like this, AL LLAH (Double L) Because of the Shadda on the 2nd L, not AL ILAH just like you said. Ilah (means God), but Allah and Llah can't be translated. the west translated it as God, which it forbidden in Islam. Mussav (talk) 21:51, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
This is not an Islamic encyclopedia, so what is "forbidden in Islam" is wholly irrelevant. --Dante Alighieri | Talk 22:07, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
you are translating something cant be trasnalted, Unless you want to spread false facts. Mussav (talk) 22:12, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
I've opened an RfC on this issue. --Dante Alighieri | Talk 22:35, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
First, who was it who said that "it is forbidden in Islam to translate the word Allah"?? This does not appear to be a majority view among Muslims, so the burden of proof would seem to be on you.
Second, the linguistic claim (which has been accepted by many -- though not all -- Muslim scholars past and present), is that الله Allah is a special contracted form of إله Ilah with an added Arabic definite article prefix (so that the glottal stop of إله disappears). This hypothesis is not universally accepted, but there are several things which are very hard to explain unless you take it as a starting point (certainly it's difficult to relate Allah to any kind of normal triconsonantal root structure without referring to a الإلاه contraction explanation). Your point about shadda is absolutely useless to explain what you want it to explain, since exactly the same thing happens when ordinary words beginning with the letter lam are prefixed with al-. So if lisan is prefixed with al-, the result al-lisan اللسان is also written with a shadda over the second letter lam. AnonMoos (talk) 22:47, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Ilah means God, right? while if You dived Allah name you will get Al and Llah (which I already explained the Shadda situation, The Shaddad thing is the major point that what scholars and Shiekhs pointed it, if it has Kasra under the name of Allah, we will have Ilah, but it doesn't has Kasra, it has Shadda which it will never turn it to Ilah "God") there is no Ilah as you claim. Mussav (talk) 22:59, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but this really doesn't make as much sense as you think it does. First off, the first lam consonant in Allah is actually completely SILENT, so that if you insist on dividing الله phonetically after the second letter, then you would actually get a- and -llah. But I have no idea what this procedure is supposed to prove, since if you insist on dividing اللسان phonetically after the second letter, then you would get a- and -llisan. What is the point of dividing the word allisan incorrectly as a-llisan instead of correctly as al-lisan; and from a morphological/phonological point of view, how does a-llah meaningfully differ from a-llisan??
Second, Al-'Ilah to Allah is a special contraction process, which was never claimed to be exactly the same as ordinary definite article prefixing. However, it's hardly the only special contraction in Classical Arabic; for example, امرؤ imru' when prefixed with the definite article becomes المرء almar' . Maybe your sheikhs can explain where the kasra of imru' goes when it becomes almar'.
Third, you still haven't provided any reference to back up the claim that "it is forbidden in Islam to translate the word Allah". Fourth, as explained elsewhere previously, Ilah does NOT mean "God" in the sense of the singular monotheistic God,; rather, it merely means "a deity, a god". AnonMoos (talk) 23:24, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
You can't do that when we have Shadda in the 2nd Lam, which it will make the L doubled, Shadda will change al-(Tanween) of the word, and if we want to remove the Shadda it will be like this, ALLLAH. any way you can ask any Scholar or Shikeh and he will tell you (التفكير في ذات الله حرام). You can use God as an Alternative name for Allah, but Allah's name can not be translated. any way I found this (for now), Sheikh who is supporting the translating of the Qur'an to English but with Keeping Allah name untranslated. link. Mussav (talk) 09:06, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
The word "tanwin" refers to certain features of indefinite case endings (إعراب), and so I have no idea what connection it's supposed to have to shadda (i.e. consonant doubling). If you're claiming that the word Allah takes indefinite case vowels (i.e. with tanwin nasal suffix), then that's simply false.
Furthermore, until you can explain how the shadda of الله is significantly different from the shadda of اللسان, then all your comments about the shadda of Allah prove exactly nothing. And one semi-randomly-Googled cybermullah is hardly impressive support for your position, given the fact that many Muslims in non-Arabic-speaking countries do translate Allah. AnonMoos (talk) 10:52, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
You don't have any Idea what is the connection? It's not my problem that Arabic Language is not your 1st Language, you should know what the connection, under the Shada on Lisan there is Kasra while there is no Kasra in Allah, there is Fatha. again, God is an alternative for Allah and not the transiting for it. can you trasnalte for me God and Allah from English to Arabic? God it will be Ilah, and Allah will stay Allah, can you see the different? maybe in Christianity it's Okay, but in Islam isn't Okay. Mussav (talk) 22:09, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
Perhaps this is the root of your misunderstanding. You cannot translate Allah from English into Arabic as it is not an English word. That's like asking me to translate fenestra from English into Latin... fenestra is Latin for the English word "window". --Dante Alighieri | Talk 00:33, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
Mussav, what difference does the following vowel make to the fact that a morpheme boundary CAN in fact occur inside lam-shadda (despite your many confused denials)? Furthermore, why do you keep saying that the Arabic word Ilah corresponds to the English capitalized word "God" (referring to the monotheistic God), when this is simply factually false????? Such blatant reiterations of falsehood do little to advance constructive discussion, or endear youself to your collocutors.
I'm sure that you learned a version of Arabic grammar concepts -- adapted for basic educational use -- which was reasonably adequate for its originally intended purposes, and that your ability to quickly sight-read long connected passages of Arabic text far exceeds mine. But unfortunately, these skills on your part do not necessarily qualify you to insightfully debate advanced etymological and historical linguistic issues. By contrast, my grounding in comparative Semitic linguistics, historical phonology, etc. leaves me incapable of conducting any conversation in Arabic beyond the most simplistically trivial, but it gives me a reasonably good understanding of the relevant linguistics involved in such etymologies. AnonMoos (talk) 09:34, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
Muslims believe in the Creator and no one lese, you believe in trinity, try to translate God from English to Arabic and you will have Ilah, and Muslim shahada is there is no Ilah except Allah. so saying God is wrong. Shadda explain everything, Lisan doesn't have Shadda, it has Kasra, while Allah has Shadda, try to remove the Shadda from the word of Jawal, it will be Jawwal, try to remove the Shadda from Hashashon, you will get Hashshashon, try to remove the Shada from Allah, you will get ALLLAH not AL Ilah just like you claimed. again Allah page need to be edited. this is my final message, because I'm wasting my time here, do do you want to spread false info? It's up to you. Mussav (talk) 21:24, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
You're certainly wasting both your own time and everybody else's time if you're just going to keep on repeating the blatantly factually false assertion that the Arabic word Ilah accurately corresponds to the English capitalized word "God" (referring to the monotheistic God). My level of patience with this particular nonsense is very rapidly diminishing with every new reiteration. AnonMoos (talk) 02:47, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
It's not my problem that Arabic is not your 1st Language. I know what I've said, if you translate "God" from English to Arabic you will never get "Allah", and you know it. you will get only Ilah, which in Islam it means any other God. any way as I said before I'm not inserted to continuo this conversation. Mussav (talk) 21:25, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] RfC: "Allah" translation issues

Should "Allah" be translated as "God" in the generic case for the takbir?

this is discussed in depth at Allah. No need to rehash this here, we can just state that some prefer the translation "God", while others prefer to leave it untranslated as a proper name. We cannot make recomendations, we'll simply note that both variants have their proponents. dab (𒁳) 14:26, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

If this has been discussed elsewhere, that's fine... do we have a standard practice on Wikipedia? Does "Allahu Akbhar" translate as "God is great" or as "Allah is great"? --Dante Alighieri | Talk 16:18, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
well, the Allah article has had "translation: God" in the infobox for ages now. I don't think we have actual guidelines on this though. I tend to favour "God is Great": actually, the elative ("great") is a much hairier problem in translation than the Allah. The history of the term Allah is precisely parallel to the history of the term God, and God (capitalized) is thus a very satisfactory translation. But we have to appreciate that there is a pov (shared by ultra-pious Muslims and Islamophobes, ironically), that Allah should be left untranslated. It is my view that we should translate God by default, and if necessary or if people insist mention the Allah-is-a-proper-name position alongside that as an alternative. But there is room for disagreement of course. dab (𒁳) 17:56, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
Admittedly, I have no WP:RS for this, but the point of leaving Allah untranslated (so that, eg Allahu akbar == Allah is great) is better accommodated by translating Allah as "the One God (by name)" rather than just "God", which despite the implied due emphasis on capitalization still invites more general philosophizing than really could apply. rudra (talk) 18:20, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
well, I don't think I quite agree. After all, Allah is the Arabic translation of "God" also in Christian texts. If God translates to Allah, why should not Allah translate to God. And then there is the ho theos monos translation of Allah. If Muslims in AD 700 felt they could translate Allah to ho theos monos, I see no reason whatsoever why the same shouldn't be permissible today. If you like, "The God is Greater", but that's not really English. dab (𒁳) 18:55, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
However, we can recognize that the majority of Muslims seem to have no great problem with translating it. And it's also the majority view among linguistic scholars that Allah is in some way related to al- + Ilah. (Mussav seems to think that these issues are connected somehow, but it's not clear to me that they are...) AnonMoos (talk) 18:46, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
You are right, of course, that the translation is informed by the al+ilah hypothesis (which, as you say, is barely disputed). Either way, this is a valid discussion, of course, but one that belongs on Talk:Allah. dab (𒁳) 20:37, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
First of All, Allah Page need to be Edited, but some people always revert it back, 2ndly I'm not the one who said that Allah name should be Divided, and if we dived Allah name we wont get the Al + Ilah thing, we will have something different because of Arabic Tanween, we will have something means nothing. Mussav (talk) 22:15, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
Mussav, it's comments such as this which make me question your grounding in formal Arabic grammar, since tanwin refers to the indefinite form of word-final noun-case endings, written with double diacritics and originally pronounced with a word-final [n] sound (though such an [n] is hardly pronounced at all in modern Arabic except in a few formal recitation contexts). You haven't given any comprehensible explanation whatsoever as to how the issue of the etymology of Allah is related to the phenomenon of Tanwin, and in fact there's no connection.
Meanwhile, if they're reverting your edits on article Allah, it's presumably because you're attempting to alter a long-standing consensus without convincing arguments. See further the links in the #Manual of Style subsection below... AnonMoos (talk) 09:09, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
When you study the Arabic language and be specialist, then you will know what the phenomenon of Tanwin, and you will know how it will affect and change the meaning of the words. that's all what I can say. peace. Mussav (talk) 11:52, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
I've studied the Arabic language quite well enough to know that many of the arguments you make simply don't support the conclusions that you're trying to assert. You would undoubtedly blow me out of the water when it comes to memorizing Qur'an verses, but I have a much more solid general linguistics background... AnonMoos (talk) 15:34, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
Mussav, you may know Arabic, but it appears your problem is that you are not aware of the semantics involved in English God. To evaluate the merit of a translation, you need to be familiar both with the source and the target language. fwiiw, tanwin is a detail of Arabic inflection and rather irrelevant to discussions of etymology. dab (𒁳) 16:47, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Manual of Style

As pointed out on the Talk:Flag of Iraq page, there's already a quasi-official policy set out at Wikipedia:MOSISLAM#Allah, which was debated quite extensively at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (Islam-related articles)/God vs Allah... AnonMoos (talk) 08:59, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

ok. the guideline is terse and sensible. Of course there is room for civil and informed debate in each instance where the topic crops up. This article, and the Allah article, of course merit an in-depth discussion of the question (while the guideline applies to any random article where mention of Allah happens to crop up). I think we agree that the full debate belongs on Talk:Allah, where anyone is welcome to make informed contributions. Allah has been remarkably stable, and a coherent proposal should be made before any substantial changes are made. For the purposes of this article, it should be sufficient to gloss Allah "[the one] God", pointing to the dedicated articles for in-depth discussion. dab (𒁳) 09:47, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
I see that {{Allah}} yields God (Arabic: الله‎ Allāh)... that might work, no? --Dante Alighieri | Talk 23:55, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
not bad, yes. --dab (𒁳) 09:19, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
It has always been my understanding that 'God' and 'god' are two different concepts in Christianity. With this idea, 'llah' referring to 'a god' would be the same as the lower-case 'god' meaning. As Allah is often translated into God, and not 'god,' it would seem to follow that 'Allah = God, and llah = god.' There is a difference between 'god' and 'God' in Christianity, and I assume other similar religions as well. At least that's what I was taught when I was still attending church, raised as a Christian.--74.67.17.22 (talk) 07:06, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] translation

It should be "God is the greatest" or "God is greatest" not "God is great" radiant guy (talk) 03:10, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] "God is Great" or "Akbar is God"

I read in my history book about the Mughal empire leader, Akbar. It says that the motto for its creed, "Divine Faith", was "Allahu Akbar" and translates it as either "God is great" or "Akbar is God". As it's an American textbook, I'm not too trusting of its Arabic translation. Is there any truth to this translation? If so, it should be mentioned in the article --98.209.70.216 (talk) 16:15, 30 April 2008 (UTC)