The word or name God what Language it originated from before it wuz adopted in the English language?

Question

I learned in Bible college that the word god did not originate in the Anglo/Saxon languages. No wonder in English it is spelled dog in reverse but did not have the same mean'n in the previous language it wuz borrowed from. In the USA it is mentioned on all of the note bills (curency). Do U k'now why and by whom?

Answer 1

YOU went to Bible College and don't know the original language that God's name came from.... Where did you find this college... on the back of a match book?

Answer 2

"God" has been in English since Old English and arrived in English from the Germanic languages. The Germanic languages originated with the Indo European languages and even there the word was "ghut". This is also seen in the Sanskrit "hu" (which means "to invoke the gods"). That takes us back 4000-5000 years with the word changing little in that time. "God" might be "dog" spelled backwards but the two words are unrelated. Other similar pairs are similarly unrelated bat/tab, pan/nap, but/tub, net/ten etc etc.

Answer 3

O.E. god "supreme being, deity," from P.Gmc. *guthan (cf. Du. god, Ger. Gott, O.N. guð, Goth. guþ), from PIE *ghut- "that which is invoked" (cf. Skt. huta- "invoked," an epithet of Indra), from root *gheu(e)- "to call, invoke." But some trace it to PIE *ghu-to- "poured," from root *gheu- "to pour, pour a libation" (source of Gk. khein "to pour," khoane "funnel" and khymos "juice;" also in the phrase khute gaia "poured earth," referring to a burial mound). "Given the Greek facts, the Germanic form may have referred in the first instance to the spirit immanent in a burial mound" [Watkins]. Not related to good. Originally neut. in Gmc., the gender shifted to masc. after the coming of Christianity. O.E. god was probably closer in sense to L. numen. A better word to translate deus might have been P.Gmc. *ansuz, but this was only used of the highest deities in the Gmc. religion, and not of foreign gods, and it was never used of the Christian God. It survives in Eng. mainly in the personal names beginning in Os-.

"I want my lawyer, my tailor, my servants, even my wife to believe in God, because it means that I shall be cheated and robbed and cuckolded less often. ... If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him." [Voltaire]

First record of Godawful "terrible" is from 1878; God speed as a parting is from c.1470. God-fearing is attested from 1835. God bless you after someone sneezes is credited to St. Gregory the Great, but the pagan Romans (Absit omen) and Greeks had similar customs.

Short version, travel to the Netherlands and find God, go a little up and you'll find gud in old Norse, go to Germany and you'll find Gott, travel to the Indo-European root, which is a language half way from Sanskrit and the European languages, actually it is the root of European languages and you'll find the root gheu.
Probably I wasn't clear enough but I tryied to do my best. What you are looking for is the etymology of the word, I have resorted to philology a branch of linguistics

Answer 4

Yahoo answers has officialy become the word of god.