# Bosnian (BCS): Allah (declension)



## Al-Indunisiy

How do Bosnians decline the word 'Allah'?


----------



## DenisBiH

Al-Indunisiy said:


> How do Bosnians decline the word 'Allah'?



N. Allah 
G. Allaha
D. Allahu 
A. Allaha 
V. Allahu 
I. Allahom
L. Allahu

Allahu in vocative is pronounced differently than dative/locative, but I can't write the accents.


----------



## iobyo

Is _Al(l)aše _also considered a valid vocative form?


----------



## Duya

Actually, how is the word commonly spelled in Bosnia nowadays? Serbian and Croatian Wikipedia, as well as Serbian Pravopis, spell it as  _Alah, and g_emination (a*ll*ah) is not common in native words, except in few cases on morpheme boundaries. However, Bosnian Wikipedia spells it _Allah_. I can imagine that the word would deserve a special status, being the title of the ultimate deity, at least among Muslims.


----------



## Duya

iobyo said:


> Is _Al(l)aše _also considered a valid vocative form?



HJP gives only the form "Alaše", so yes. However, it sounds odd to my ears, and I've only heard "Alahu".


----------



## Majalj

I don't think that palatalization (_h _to _š_)is allowed, as it is a word of foreign origin, and it can be treated as proper name. But I'm not sure.


----------



## DenisBiH

Duya said:


> Actually, how is the word commonly spelled in Bosnia nowadays? Serbian and Croatian Wikipedia, as well as Serbian Pravopis, spell it as  _Alah, and g_emination (a*ll*ah) is not common in native words, except in few cases on morpheme boundaries. However, Bosnian Wikipedia spells it _Allah_. I can imagine that the word would deserve a special status, being the title of the ultimate deity, at least among Muslims.




Senahid Halilović (Pravopis bosanskoga jezika) gives only Allah with two l's.

And "ultimate" would be slightly incorrect since it could imply there are more, perhaps better use "only" when referring to Muslim belief. Pre-Islamic Arabs on the other hand might have considered Allah as the ultimate deity along with other deities they believed existed.


----------



## sokol

DenisBiH said:


> Allahu in vocative is pronounced differently than dative/locative, but I can't write the accents.


You can use lexilogos for that - it would be nice if you could add the accents.


----------



## Duya

That's the sole thing my cell phone is good at  :

N. Àllāh (d'oh, don't have the macron  ) Mod note - accent consolidation 
G. Alláha
D. Alláhu
A. Alláha
V. Ȁllāhu
I. Alláhom
L. Alláhu


----------



## Al-Indunisiy

Duya said:


> That's the sole thing my cell phone is good at  :
> 
> N. Àllāh (d'oh, don't have the macron  ) Mod note - accent consolidation
> G. Alláha
> D. Alláhu
> A. Alláha
> V. Ȁllāhu
> I. Alláhom
> L. Alláhu


 
Why do I find the form Allahov in many bosnian articles (ex.: Allahov Poslanik), and in the Saudi issued translation of the Quran(Kuran s prevodom)?



> [2.40] O sinovi Israilovi! Sjetite se blagodati Moje kojom sam vas obdario i ispunite zavjet Meni, ispuniću i ja zavjet vama, i Mene - ta Mene se bojte!


 
Seems to be present also in the word 'Israil'.


----------



## DenisBiH

Al-Indunisiy said:


> Why do I find the form Allahov in many bosnian articles (ex.: Allahov Poslanik), and in the Saudi issued translation of the Quran(Kuran s prevodom)?




Allahov is a possessive adjective derived with the suffix -ov.


----------



## Al-Indunisiy

Thank you all.


----------



## bibax

And how to decline Allah in plural? Allasi, Allahā, Allasima, ...?


----------



## DenisBiH

bibax said:


> And how to decline Allah in plural? Allasi, Allahā, Allasima, ...?




At the moment I do not have access to the Bosnian grammar currently in use, but if it continued to apply the rules that were applied here in the Serbo-Croatian standard (which is usually the case), personal names (such as Allah), gramatically would not be used in plural (although everyday speech might show some such uses). Consult this:



> osebna su imena pojedinih bića i predmeta i zovu se * vlastite ** imenice. * Iz toga što označavaju pojedina živa bića i pojedine predmete proizilazi njihovo svojstvo da se* ne upotrebljavaju u množini. *


And, on a somewhat more social rather than purely linguistic note, in the case of the name "Allah", the use of plural would make even less sense given that the primary Muslim belief is precisely the oneness of God. Generally I have never heard it used in plural.

When someone wants to refer to other religions which had beliefs in multiple deities, one usually uses bogovi (gods) or božanstva (deities).


----------



## bibax

I never heard that the proper names cannot be used in plural. You can used them in plural forms at least metonymically.

It's posible to say, for example: "With all those Jesuses, Allahs, Buddhas, ..." (sa svima Jesusima, Allasima?, Buddhama...).


----------



## DenisBiH

bibax said:


> I never heard that the proper names cannot be used in plural. You can used them in plural forms at least metonymically.
> 
> It's posible to say, for example: "With all those Jesuses, Allahs, Buddhas, ..." (sa svima Jesusima, Allasima?, Buddhama...).




You are right, there are exceptions, I should have mentioned them explicitly.

The only two exceptions to personal names not being used in plural cited in the book linked to above are

a) Names that refer to two or more geographical objects (countries, cities, mountains, rivers), such as Amerike (Americas)
b) When personal names are used in plural not to refer to multiple people of the same name, but to indicate multiple people with the same character trait(s) as the person with the name being used



> Ponekad se i lična imena upotrebljavaju u množini, kao u primeru_..._Ali ovo sada više nije lično ime, niti se lična imena ikad upotrebljavaju u množini da označe više lica s tim imenom, nego samo za označavanje više lica s nekom karakterističnom osobinom ličnosti koja nosi, ili je nosila dotično ime.


Maybe the second exception would match your example. Google search for _allasi site:.ba _shows exactly one example of such a use of "Allasi", in a blog post, so I guess such use as in b) would be pretty much a no-go in standard Bosnian (due to the factors mentioned above). Again, I've never heard it personally.

However, Serbian and Croatian might show such uses, but we should wait for confirmation of Serbian/Croatian native speakers.

Btw, Jesus in Bosnian is usually Isus; or alternatively Isa (when referring to the Muslim view/understanding of the same historical personality).

A side note: very often, the name Allah is accompanied in writing and speech with dž.š. pronounced as  dželle-šanuhu, which Senahid Halilović translates as _Neka je slavno Uzvišeno __Biće Njegovo_ - "may His Exalted Being be glorious". Modern usage by some people shows also Allah swt parallel to other Muslims' usage. Similarly, when referring to Jesus as an Islamic personality, one usually adds a.s. (alejhi-selam "peace be upon him") after his name - Isa a.s. It's similar with other personalities which are considered Islamic messengers.


----------



## Duya

Well, it is apparently _possible_ to make plural _Alasi_, but I doubt it would be _sensible_. Alah is one and only by definition, and it's rather hard to imagine a context in which the plural would fit, even metonymically.
In Bibax's example, Buddha and Jesus were prophets, but Allah is not -- Muhammed is -- so it's not even remotely realistic.


----------



## DenisBiH

Duya said:


> Well, it is apparently _possible_ to make plural _Alasi_, but I doubt it would be _sensible_. Alah is one and only by definition, and it's rather hard to imagine a context in which the plural would fit, even metonymically.
> In Bibax's example, Buddha and Jesus were prophets, but Allah is not -- Muhammed is -- so it's not even remotely realistic.




I'm still wondering about one thing.

Mihailo Stevanović in the above cited "Savremeni srpskohrvatski jezik" is quite categorical that personal names are not to be used in plural to denote multiple people of the same name. But in everyday speech hearing some such uses would not be too strange, for example Facebook shows several groups titled "Za sve Alme...". This is either a more recent development or something that Stevanović frowned upon if it existed back then.

But on the other hand, for some names I wouldn't even be sure how to make plural even for such uses. For Branko - is it Branci or Brankovi? Or Bra:nke?

Btw, maybe this line of discussion should be split into a new thread?​


----------



## bibax

> Well, it is apparently possible to make plural Alasi, but I doubt it would be sensible.


But the morphology (as a part of grammar) is not about a sense.

Moreover I can imagine someone says: "I am not interested in all those Jesuses, Allahs and such". It is sensible to me (but hardly to a Muslim).

The rhetoric figure "all those + a proper name in plural" is very common especially in political contexts (all those Stalins, Titos, Maozedongs, etc.). Our politicians used it very often.


----------



## DenisBiH

> But the morphology (as a part of grammar) is not about a sense.


What about singularia tantum nouns? I could quite easily decline omladina "youth" or stoka "cattle" in plural, but I would have no idea where to use it...

Or are you saying that a form exists in a language by the very possibility that it could exist, no matter that it is not actually used?





> The rhetoric figure "all those + a proper name in plural" is very common especially in political contexts (all those Stalins, Titos, Maozedongs, etc.). Our politicians used it very often.


What is very common in Czech or English might not be common or even present in other languages. "Very common" is a somewhat subjective term unless you have a specific study in mind that was done regarding that particular usage. For starters, I wouldn't even be sure how to say "Titos" - Tita? Titoi?


----------



## bibax

In Czech the nominative plural ending of the animate masculine nouns is _-ové_ which is quite universal: Alláhové, Titové, Brankové, etc.

On the other side we have a problem with the locative plural ending _-ích_: kolezích (sg. kolega), Allázích, Brancích. Such forms sound really strange. It seems that the ending _-ích_ is not quite compatible with the nouns of foreign origin.

In any case it's a question of morphology and morphology doesn't ask why for hell's sake we need just a locative plural form of the God's name.


----------



## Duya

But, regardless if it's Allah, Branko or Alma, personal nouns technically don't have plural in standard BCS. If you need it, you would have to use a workaround, e.g. "sve žene po imenu Alma."

In substandard usage, or under _licencia poetica_, you certainly could apply standard affixes to personal names, with varying degrees of euphony. It works well for feminine names (Alme, Marije), or polysyllabic masculines ending in consonant or -a (Denisi, Miroslavi, Allasi, Nikole), but badly for monosyllabic ones (*Johnovi?, *Janovi?) and not at all for ones ending in -o or -e (Marko, Branko, Đorđe). But still, we aren't talking about "correctness" but "degrees of incorrectness".


----------

