Etymology
1. 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.
2. Etymology tree
3. Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰew-
4. Proto-Indo-European *-tós
5. Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰutós?
6. Proto-Germanic *gudą
7. Proto-West Germanic *god
8. Old English god
9. Middle English god
10. English god
11. Inherited from Middle English god, from Old English god, originally neuter, then changed to masculine to reflect the change in religion to Christianity, from Proto-West Germanic *god n, from Proto-Germanic *gudą; see there for further origin.
12. Cognates
13. Cognate with Scots God (“God”), Yola God, Gud (“God”), gud (“god”), Saterland Frisian God (“God”), West Frisian God (“God”), god (“deity, god”), Alemannic German, Cimbrian, German, Luxembourgish and Mòcheno Gott (“God”), Central Franconian Jott (“God”), Dutch god (“deity, god”), Limburgish Gód (“God”), gód (“god”), Vilamovian Göt (“God”), Yiddish גאָט (got, “god; God”), Danish, Norwegian Bokmål and Swedish gud (“god; God”), Faroese Gud (“God”), Icelandic goð (“idol, pagan god”), guð, Guð (“God”), Norwegian Nynorsk Gu, Gud (“God”), gu, gud (“god”), Gothic 𐌲𐌿𐌸 (guþ, “deity, god; God”).
14. Not related to the word good or Persian خدا (xodâ, “god”).