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What Is the Difference Between Allah and God?
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“Allah” in calligraphy
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“Allah” in calligraphy
“Allah” in calligraphy Calligraphic representation of the word Allāh in Arabic on the domed ceiling of Türkmenbaşi Ruhy mosque in Ashgabat, Turkmenistan.

What Is the Difference Between Allah and God?

Written by
Adam Zeidan
Adam Zeidan is an Assistant Managing Editor, having joined Encyclopædia Britannica in 2018.
Adam Zeidan
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Allah (الله) is the Arabic word for “God” and is used as a proper noun. In Arabic it is used by Muslims, Christians, and Jews alike to refer to God. It is known especially from the basmalah, the formulaic prayer in the first verse of the Qurʾān: bism Allāh al-Raḥman al-Raḥīm (“In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate”). The Christian Nicene Creed in Arabic describes rabb wāḥid Yasūʿ al-Masīḥ, ibn Allāh al-waḥīd (“One Lord Jesus Christ, the only son of God”). Although Arabic is usually associated with Islam, pre-Islamic Arabs, such as the Christian Ghassanids and Lakhmids, already used the word Allāh for God. Homilies and liturgical texts written in Syriac, one of the primary languages for early Christian literature and a close relative of Arabic, also used a nearly homophonous word, Ālāhā (ܐܠܗܐ), to refer to God in the centuries before Muhammad was born. Arabic speakers of all faiths use phrases such as in shāʾa Allāh (“God-willing”) and al-ḥamdu li-(A)llāh (“Glory be to God”) in everyday speech.

In English usage the word typically refers to God only in an Islamic context. Some English-speaking Muslims refer to God as “Allah” because of the special role that Arabic plays in Islamic religious practice. Muslims consider the Qurʾān to be the literal word of God. Since they believe God called himself Allāh in the Qurʾān, which he revealed to Muhammad in Arabic, they use the same word out of reverence.

Non-Muslim English speakers sometimes use “Allah” in order to make a distinction between God in an Islamic context and God in a biblical context. Such distinctions stress theological differences, such as the Islamic doctrine of taw︎ḥīd (oneness of God) versus the Christian dogma of the Trinity, rather than the similarities, such as the shared monotheism, prophetic tradition (including Abraham, Moses, David, Jesus, and others), and beliefs in God’s omnipotence, omniscience, and divine revelations to humanity.

Adam Zeidan