I saw this in a recent thread, and felt like commenting, but I'm not going to do it on that thread, because I would rather it died. :) So I'll do it here.

"some get offended when you take the Lord's name in vain. There is a religious commandment that forbids it, but I realize that most disregard this today."

Now, I have problem wth this - let's get that clear. What intrigued me was another quote I read recently, which struck me, specifically the first bit.

"A cultured Mohamedan once remarked to us, 'You Christians are so occupied in misinterpreting the fourth commandment that you have never thought of making an artistic application of the second.' "

The fourth commandment is "Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain." (Exodus 20)

Consider- for a conservative Christian, mentioning God's name, in almost any context, tends to be bad. But Moslems speak of Allah all the time - it's an inherent part of their language. "Inshallah" - If Allah wills it. "Glory be to Allah," or "Allah is good, Allah is great" are found at the end of many sentences in Arabic histories, books, and poems. They state the name of their God without fear, and, it seems, without taking it in vain.

Further thoughts - my understanding was that the early Jews did not speak the name of the Lord - in fact, where his name is written in texts, it is written as YHVH (Yod he vav he), but read aloud as Adonai, which means Our Lord. The name was considered too sacred to speak aloud. In many other religions, it is a common theme and belief that names have power - often great power. Invoking the name of a god, goddess, demon, or even just a person was an action of power. Names identify us, define us, and have power over us - this is recognised in many different cultures.

This is an intriguing concept to me, but at the moment I haven't reached any conclusions about it. I thought I'd throw it out and see what the varied masses in Mudcat make of it. So - Thoughts?

-Jessica