Talk:Khalid ibn al-Walid

Allah or God

I have changed the article to use the term "Allah" instead of "God" because it's far more accurate. Whilst the term God is used in English to refer to the Creator, it is also used to refer to several other things, thus it is ambiguous (not that I'm implying it's confusing). The term Allah is used to specifically refer to the One Almighty Creator, it is an exclusive term, and is one of the names of the Creator.

Khalid bin al-Walid was known as the Sword of Allah. A google search quickly brings up several references to him (almost exclusively) under this search. Sword of God brings up search results relating to music. It's clearly not the same.

Lastly, God is not english for Allah. The term "God" does exist in Arabic, it is "Ilah". This can be translated into english as God, but Allah cannot. Therefore, when Khalid was asking the Prophet (pbuh) to pray for him, he would have asked him to pray to Allah, not God (Ilah). The same applies to the shahada. When a Muslim says "Lā 'ilāha 'illā llāha", they are saying "There is no god but Allah". To say "There is no god but God" is silly and is a limitation of the english language as the english language does not provide a unique name for the Creator. Two different terms are used, Ilah and Allah, they should not be mixed together to refer to the same thing.

Thus, the correct term to use when refering to God in an Islamic context is Allah. Otherwise Islamic figures are being misrepresented and accuracy is lost.

unfortunately, you are not correct. Illah translates to 'god' (note the lower-case G) -- whereas, Allah (the One God) translates to 'God' (capital G). writing Allah in english leads to confusion, particularly implying to people who know little about Islam, that Muslims worship a 'separate' or 'different' God. if you browse any academic text, you will never see 'Allah' written, unless it's a transliteration or a direct quote. if you want to write, 'Sayf-Allah' as the transliteration of 'Sword of God', that's fine. but writing 'Sword of Allah' is incorrect.

OK, so what about Hindu gods? Do they all translate to God again, or are their names preserved? I also don't agree with the comment that "Allah is Arabic, God is English". Allah is a name. By that logic, Jason should be converted to Judas or Javed for other languages. That's clearly not right.

Incidentally, depending on the author, I'd expect to see "Allah" in academic text. I don't think any non-Muslim would have the respect for the name Allah to keep it as so, but I'd expect every Muslim to do so. The term Allah is used instead of Ilah for a reason.

hindu gods are different -- because these are names for various representations of God. similarly, scholars would write 'Yahweh' or 'Jehovah' but they wouldnt write 'Elohim' or 'Adonay'. in the context of pre-Islamic jahiliyyah, scholars would write Allah -- because it was the name of one from a pantheon of gods. ... as far as authors -- look at any academic text (i am not talking about polemics), written by any scholar (religion doesnt matter: muslim, christian, jewish) -- they will never write Allah in place for God unless its a discussion about the term itself (for that matter, nor would a reputable encyclopaedia).