Meaning of Allah?

I think god, but azimuth can say the correct answer.

I think it literally means the God.Proper name for God in Arabic is ilah I belive.Adding AL in front gives an equavalent meaning of The in English.I might be wrong tho...

Turkified word ilah has a different meaning since it can refer to more than one thing.But in Arabic it refers to only one, which is Allah

In Aramaic EL means God as well.It make sense since they are all semitic languages with common origns.

Does Allah or Ilah existed with the exact same meaning of today in pre-islamic Arabia,or it was introduced after the Islamization of the Arab peninsula?

 

Allah Means God , the only God. or the supreme God for the pre-islamic Arabs.

Pre-Islamic Arabs were christans, jews and idol worshipers and others who worshipped th sun and the moon.

the Jews and the Christan Arabs called God Allah

the Idol worshippers called their Idols Aalihah, meaning gods, and those Aalihah were worshiped so they can be the link between them and the supreme God who is Allah.

Elah means god/lord but it can be used as any god for example we can say "Zeus is Elah al Yonan" meaning Zeus is Greek's god.

the term Allah to be used only when refering to the God belived to be the One and the only god worshiped by jews, christans and muslims.

again the pre-islamic arabs who worshiped idols did belive that there is a God who is one an only and the supreme, the idols they worshiped were considered minor gods who are closer to Allah and they thought worshipping those idols will make them loved by the only supreme God who is Allah.

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the term is Semitic and its the closest to the Aramaic term Elohi, when Arabs pray to God and say "My God" they say "Elahi".

 

lol

in Old english i believe "Al" means fire. so maybe he was originally a fire god?

Originally posted by Achilles in Old english i believe "Al" means fire. so maybe he was originally a fire god?

Obviously "al" is the definite article "the" in Arabic (simmilar to Vulgar Latin/Italian "il"). "Al-Illah" then means "the god" or rather "The God".

I've also read that is interpreted as "the one who is" but I dont know if this has some basis or is just a ranting.

I think that "lah", "elo" or "ilu" is a root common to all semitic languages, meaning God. Aside from all the examples that you guys mentioned, I would add Babylon, in Akkadian Bab-ilu, or gate of the Gods. 'Bab" in this case is certainly gate, similar to Arabic (ex: Bab-el-mandab straits: the gate of tears). "Al", as Maju mentioned, means "the". Another example would be the biblical "Elohim", or "the gods".

Edited by Decebal

Elohim

No. Elohim is just the plural form of "god" in Hebrew. The structure of the word changes in semitic languages when deriving new words or making it plural. For example "Etrak" means "Turks". Words are based on consonant groups such as "Trk" or "hfz". From "hfz", you can derive many words, muhafiz, muhafaza, hafiza, hafz etc. as I know.