An old woman in a Catholic village in Malta is saying the Hail Mary in Maltese. It is the prayer to Mary (peace be upon her). Halfway through, she says Omm Alla: 'Mother of God'. In a gurdwara in west London, musicians sing a hymn by the poet Kabir from the Sikh scripture: 'First, Allah created the Light.' In Haifa and in Harrow, Bahá'ís wash their hands and face, sit quietly and repeat Alláh-u-Abhá, 'God the All-Glorious', ninety-five times.
None of them is Muslim. The word Allah belongs to Arabic, and Arabic has travelled. Along the way it has been taken up by languages, scriptures and faiths you might not expect, and, as with anything that travels, a few tall stories have attached themselves to it. Here is the record, sorted from the myths.
“Those who have been driven from their homes unjustly only because they said: Our Lord is Allah - For had it not been for Allah's repelling some men by means of others, cloisters and churches and oratories and mosques, wherein the name of Allah is oft mentioned, would assuredly have been pulled down. Verily Allah helpeth one who helpeth Him. Lo! Allah is Strong, Almighty -.”
Qur'an 22:40 · Pickthall (1930)
This is one of the earliest verses to give Muslims permission to defend themselves. It names four kinds of house of worship together, and says God's name is 'much remembered' in all of them. Muslim commentators have long read it as a duty to protect other faiths' places of prayer.
What the record shows
The Sikh scripture. The Guru Granth Sahib, compiled in 1604, calls God 'Allah' 38 times. We counted every word in its 1,430 pages (angs) using the open BaniDB database, then checked each match by hand, leaving out look-alike words such as alakh, 'the Unseen'. The 38 come from six authors: Kabir 15, Guru Arjan 11, Sheikh Farid 6, Guru Nanak 4, Guru Amar Das 1 and Namdev 1. You may read online that the word appears 'over 1,000 times'. That is false. Thirty-eight is remarkable enough.
What the Gurus say. The best-known line is Guru Arjan's ekō alahu pārbraham, 'Allah and Parbrahm are One' (ang 897), putting a Muslim and a Hindu name side by side for the one God. Kabir asks, 'If Allah lives only in the mosque, then to whom does the rest of the world belong?' (ang 1349). Kabir and Sheikh Farid were not Sikhs: Kabir was born into a Muslim weaver family and Farid was a Sufi of the Chishti order. The Gurus included their verses because they spoke of the One. For Sikhs, God is Ik Oankar, One, and every name is a name of that One; using 'Allah' does not mean adopting Islamic theology.
The Bahá'í Faith. Bahá'u'lláh's book of laws, the Kitáb-i-Aqdas, says that every believer should each day, 'having washed his hands and then his face, seat himself and, turning unto God, repeat "Alláh-u-Abhá" ninety-five times'. The phrase means 'God the All-Glorious', and Bahá'ís use it as a greeting too. Bahá'ís describe their faith as an independent world religion, not a branch of Islam.
Malta. Maltese grew from the Arabic spoken in Sicily and Malta in the Middle Ages, and it kept its Semitic core through centuries of Catholic life. So in this European Union country the word for God is Alla. The Maltese Bible uses it, the Hail Mary says Omm Alla, and people still bless each other with Alla jbierek, 'God bless you'. A study of Maltese religious words places these phrases among the oldest layer of the language.
Indonesia and Malaysia. Christians in the Malay world have read Allah in their Bibles since Albert Ruyl's Malay Gospel of Matthew in 1629. The Indonesian Bible Society explains that 'Allah' translates the Hebrew Elohim, Eloah and El, while 'TUHAN' in capitals stands for the divine name. A 1968 meeting of church leaders agreed to keep 'Allah', though a small minority still objects. In Malaysia the word went to court. A Catholic newspaper lost its case in 2014. Then, in 2021, the High Court struck down a 1986 ban in a case brought by a Christian from Sarawak. The government withdrew its appeal in 2023, and the Prime Minister said the ruling applied to Sarawak. Use of the word by non-Muslims remains restricted in much of the country. People of good will in Malaysia hold different views, and we report the legal history only.
Two myths, gently. The 'Allah Upanishad' is a real Sanskrit text, but it is not ancient: most scholars date it to the court of the Mughal emperor Akbar in the sixteenth century, and it is not among the traditional 108 Upanishads. And the line from the Rigveda (2.1.11) sometimes quoted as naming 'Ila' as God is a hymn to Agni, the fire, in which iḷā is the sacred offering, personified as a goddess of speech. Sanskrit and Arabic belong to different language families; the sounds match by coincidence. Neither myth is needed. The true story is already wide enough.
What each faith says
Judaism
“For from the rising of the sun even unto the going down of the same My name is great among the nations; And in every place offerings are presented unto My name, Even pure oblations; For My name is great among the nations, Saith the LORD of hosts.”
Malachi 1:11 · JPS 1917
Arabic-speaking Jews used the word for a thousand years. Saadia Gaon's tenth-century Arabic Torah, written in Hebrew letters, calls God Allāh about 1,650 times and renders the Shema 'Know, O Israel: Allah is our Lord, Allah the One'. For Saadia, this was simply the Arabic word for the God of Israel.
Judaism has always held that God's name is honoured among the nations, even where Israel's covenant is not shared. The prophet Malachi says so in a line Jews read with pride.
That Arabic-speaking Jewish world left an extraordinary archive. For centuries the Ben Ezra Synagogue in Fustat, old Cairo, stored worn-out pages in its genizah, a store-room for texts that bear God's name and may not be thrown away. Some 200,000 fragments, many in Judeo-Arabic, are now in Cambridge University Library, brought there by Solomon Schechter in 1896–97.
Christianity
“First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, that your faith is proclaimed throughout the whole world.”
Romans 1:8 · WEB
Christians translate the Bible into every language they can, using the word for God that each language already has: Theos, Deus, God, Dieu. Where that word is Allah or Alla, Christians use it. That is why Christians in the Arab world, Malta, Indonesia, Nigeria's Hausa-speaking north and Malaysia's Sabah and Sarawak pray to Allah, and have done for centuries.
Most churches see this as faithful translation, not compromise. Some Christians prefer other words, and they make their case from within their own tradition. Both views are Christian conversations.
In Malta the word is part of daily devotion. Maltese Catholics pray Missierna, the Lord's Prayer, and the rosary in their own Semitic language, and the Maltese Bible names God as Alla throughout.
Islam
“Say (unto mankind): Cry unto Allah, or cry unto the Beneficent, unto whichsoever ye cry (it is the same). His are the most beautiful names. And thou (Muhammad), be not loud-voiced in thy worship nor yet silent therein, but follow a way between.”
Qur'an 17:110 · Pickthall (1930)
For Muslims, Allah is God's own name, and the Qur'an encourages calling on Him by His beautiful names: 'Say (unto mankind): Cry unto Allah, or cry unto the Beneficent, unto whichsoever ye cry (it is the same). His are the most beautiful names. And thou (Muhammad), be not loud-voiced in thy worship nor yet silent therein, but follow a way between.' (17:110, Pickthall). Muslims do not claim that others who say 'Allah' share Muslim belief. Sikh, Bahá'í and Christian uses of the word belong to those faiths and are best explained in their own words.
The Qur'an also says that human variety is by design: 'O mankind! Lo! We have created you male and female, and have made you nations and tribes that ye may know one another. Lo! the noblest of you, in the sight of Allah, is the best in conduct. Lo! Allah is Knower, Aware.' (49:13, Pickthall). Hearing God's name in another community's prayer is one way of coming to know them.
Same and different
Jews, Christians and Muslims agree that God can be named in any language, and Arabic speakers of all three faiths have said Allāh for centuries. Sikhs and Bahá'ís, whose faiths are their own, also use the word in their scriptures and prayers. They genuinely differ about who God is, how He has spoken and how He should be worshipped. A shared word opens a door; it does not erase what lies on either side of it.
A moment to reflect
- Kabir asked who the rest of the world belongs to, if God lives only in the mosque. How would you answer him?
- Why might a faith choose to keep an old word for God, even when some people object to it?
- How can you check a striking number you see online, such as 'over 1,000 times'?
- What do you think a word owes to the people who use it, and what do they owe to the word?
Watch
A Sikh teacher explains how Sikhs understand the Guru Granth Sahib, in Sikh words.
A short introduction to the Bahá'í Faith from a Bahá'í channel.
A friendly look at Maltese, Europe's only Semitic national language, and its Arabic roots.
The Indonesian Bible Society explains, in Indonesian, why its Bibles say 'Allah'.
The Lord's Prayer said in Arabic, filmed at a London church.
Do it together
Most gurdwaras welcome visitors and serve free food from the langar kitchen. Cover your head, remove your shoes, and ask whether someone can show you a page with Kabir's or Farid's verses.
Learn 'God bless you' in Maltese (Alla jbierek), Arabic, Hebrew and two other languages your class or street speaks. Make a poster of them for the hall or the front window.
Print three claims from this page: 'Allah appears over 1,000 times in the Sikh scripture', 'Maltese Catholics call God Alla', 'The Allah Upanishad is ancient'. Vote first, then check the sources together.
Browse the Cairo Genizah fragments on the Cambridge Digital Library: shopping lists, letters, poems and prayers written by Jews in Arabic and Hebrew. Find one fragment that mentions God and ask why a community would keep every scrap that bore His name.
Attend a service at an Arabic-speaking church near you, Coptic, Antiochian Orthodox, Maronite or Arabic Anglican, with permission. Listen for Allāh in the Lord's Prayer and the creed.
Go deeper
- Guru Granth Sahib, ang 897 (SikhiToTheMax) · scripture
- The Kitáb-i-Aqdas (Bahá'í Reference Library) · scripture
- Setting the record straight about LAI translations (Indonesian Bible Society) · article
- Genesis 1:17 in the Maltese Bible · scripture
- Qur'an 22:40 · scripture
- Taylor-Schechter Genizah Research Unit (Cambridge University Library) · article
- Saadya [Saadiah] Gaon (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) · article
Sources (10)
- 38 occurrences of 'Allah' in the Guru Granth Sahib, by author; method; 'over 1,000' false: Our count of all 1,430 angs via the BaniDB API (data file R17_GGS_ALLAH_OCCURRENCES.csv)
- Kabir, ang 1349: 'If the Lord Allah lives only in the mosque…'; 'First, Allah created the Light': Guru Granth Sahib, ang 1349 (Sant Singh Khalsa translation)
- Kitáb-i-Aqdas ¶18: repeat 'Alláh-u-Abhá' ninety-five times; note 33: 'God the All-Glorious': Bahá'í Reference Library
- Maltese Omm Alla and Alla jbierek among the oldest religious layer of the language: Trimble, Journal of Maltese Studies 9 (1973), pp. 59–67
- LAI: 'Allah' = Elohim, Eloah, El; TUHAN = the divine name; Cipayung 1968; Ruyl's Matthew 1629: Lembaga Alkitab Indonesia, 26 June 2024
- Federal Court refused the Herald leave to appeal, 4–3, 23 June 2014: The Star, 24 June 2014
- High Court struck down the 1986 directive, March 2021: Malay Mail, 19 March 2021
- Government withdrew its appeal; PM: ruling applies to Sarawak: The Vibes, May 2023
- Rigveda 2.1.11 is addressed to Agni; iḷā as libation and goddess of speech: Rig Veda, Griffith translation (1896)
- Allopanishad dated to Akbar's time; not in the canon of 108: Wikipedia, Allopanishad (citing Raghavan 1966 and others)