We can all do better
Honoured
or dishonoured
What each faith teaches about using God's Name in vain, and how the way we live honours it.
Three faiths · The Name, honoured or dishonoured
Riz's question for all of us: has God's Name been used in vain, by Jews, Christians and Muslims alike? Every faith already asks itself this. The people who most dishonour God's Name are those who hate and kill in it, and each faith says so to its own people first.
Judaism
Ḥillul HaShem
Desecrating the Name is not only about words. A learned person who cheats in business or is harsh with people profanes God's Name, Maimonides wrote; honest, gentle conduct sanctifies it (kiddush HaShem). The Talmud counts misuse of the Name among the gravest sins (Yoma 86a).
Christianity
Hallowed be thy name
The third commandment, “Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain” (Exodus 20:7), and the first line of the Lord's Prayer. Christians are told that “the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you” when they live badly (Romans 2:24, WEB).
Islam
Living the Names
Muslim teachers speak of taking on the character of the Names (takhalluq): to be merciful because God is ar-Raḥmān, just because He is al-ʿAdl. Saadia Gaon's Arabic Torah renders the third commandment: “Do not swear by the name of Allah your Lord falsely.”
The Talmud tells that when the Egyptians drowned in the sea, the angels wanted to sing, and God stopped them: “My handiwork is drowning in the sea, and you are singing?” (Sanhedrin 39b).
We can all do better
Not “you”, but “we”. Each of us can ask what our own conduct says about the God we name.