Khuda (, ) or Khoda is the Persian word for

God In monotheistic belief systems, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator, and principal object of faith. In polytheistic belief systems, a god is "a spirit or being believed to have created, or for controlling some part of the un ...

. Originally, it was used as a noun in reference to

Ahura Mazda Ahura Mazda (; ; or , ),The former is the New Persian rendering of the Avestan form, while the latter derives from Middle Persian. also known as Horomazes (),, is the only creator deity and Sky deity, god of the sky in the ancient Iranian ...

(the name of the God in

Zoroastrianism Zoroastrianism ( ), also called Mazdayasnā () or Beh-dīn (), is an Iranian religions, Iranian religion centred on the Avesta and the teachings of Zoroaster, Zarathushtra Spitama, who is more commonly referred to by the Greek translation, ...

Iranian languages The Iranian languages, also called the Iranic languages, are a branch of the Indo-Iranian languages in the Indo-European language family that are spoken natively by the Iranian peoples, predominantly in the Iranian Plateau. The Iranian langu ...

Turkic languages The Turkic languages are a language family of more than 35 documented languages, spoken by the Turkic peoples of Eurasia from Eastern Europe and Southern Europe to Central Asia, East Asia, North Asia (Siberia), and West Asia. The Turkic langua ...

, and many

Indo-Aryan languages The Indo-Aryan languages, or sometimes Indic languages, are a branch of the Indo-Iranian languages in the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family. As of 2024, there are more than 1.5 billion speakers, primarily concentrated east ...

employ the word. Today, it is a word that is largely used in the non-Arabic

Islamic world The terms Islamic world and Muslim world commonly refer to the Islamic community, which is also known as the Ummah. This consists of all those who adhere to the religious beliefs, politics, and laws of Islam or to societies in which Islam is ...

, with wide usage from its native country Iran, along with Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh and Pakistan. and some Muslim-majority areas of India, as well as Southern and Southwestern Russia.

Etymology

The term derives from Middle Iranian terms ''xvatay, xwadag'' meaning "lord", "ruler", "master", appearing in written form in Parthian ''kwdy'', in

Middle Persian Middle Persian, also known by its endonym Pārsīk or Pārsīg ( Inscriptional Pahlavi script: , Manichaean script: , Avestan script: ) in its later form, is a Western Middle Iranian language which became the literary language of the Sasania ...

''kwdy'', and in Sogdian ''kwdy''. It is the Middle Persian reflex of older Iranian forms such as

Avestan Avestan ( ) is the liturgical language of Zoroastrianism. It belongs to the Iranian languages, Iranian branch of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family and was First language, originally spoken during the Avestan period, Old ...

''x^va-dhata-'' "self-defined; autocrat", an epithet of

. The Kurdish term ''Xwedê'' (خودێ) and the

Pashto Pashto ( , ; , ) is an eastern Iranian language in the Indo-European language family, natively spoken in northwestern Pakistan and southern and eastern Afghanistan. It has official status in Afghanistan and the Pakistani province of Khyb ...

term ''Xdāi'' (خدۍ) are both variants of this. Prosaic usage is found for example in the

Sassanid The Sasanian Empire (), officially Eranshahr ( , "Empire of the Iranian peoples, Iranians"), was an List of monarchs of Iran, Iranian empire that was founded and ruled by the House of Sasan from 224 to 651. Enduring for over four centuries, th ...

title ''katak-xvatay'' to denote the head of a clan or extended household or in the title of the 6th century '' Khwaday-Namag'' "Book of Lords", from which the tales of Kayanian dynasty as found in the ''

Shahnameh The ''Shahnameh'' (, ), also transliterated ''Shahnama'', is a long epic poem written by the Persian literature, Persian poet Ferdowsi between and 1010 CE and is the national epic of Greater Iran. Consisting of some 50,000 distichs or couple ...

'' derive.

Zoroastrian usage

Semi-religious usage appears, for example, in the epithet ''zaman-i derang xvatay'' "

time Time is the continuous progression of existence that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, and into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequ ...

of the long dominion", as found in the ''

Menog-i Khrad The ''Mēnōg-ī Khrad'' () or ''Spirit of Wisdom'' is one of the most important secondary texts in Zoroastrianism written in Middle Persian. Also transcribed in Pazend as ''Minuy-e X(e/a)rad'' and in New Persian ''Minu-ye Xeræd'', the text is a ...

''. The fourth and eighty-sixth entry of the Pazend prayer titled '' 101 Names of God'', ''Harvesp-Khoda'' "Lord of All" and ''Khudawand'' "Lord of the Universe", respectively, are compounds involving ''Khuda''. Application of ''khoda'' as "''the'' Lord" (

) is represented in the first entry in the medieval ''

Frahang-i Pahlavig ''Frahang-ī Pahlavīg'' (Middle Persian: 𐭯𐭥𐭧𐭭𐭢 𐭯𐭧𐭫𐭥𐭩𐭪 "Pahlavi dictionary") is the title of an anonymous dictionary of mostly Aramaic logograms with Middle Persian translations (in Pahlavi script) and translit ...

''.

Islamic usage

In Islamic times, the term came to be used for

God in Islam In Islam, God (, contraction of , ) is seen as the Creator god, creator and God the Sustainer, sustainer of the universe, who God and eternity, lives eternally. God is conceived as a perfect, Tawhid, singular, immortal, omnipotent, and omnisc ...

, paralleling the Arabic name of God ''Al-Malik'' "Owner, King, Lord, Master". The phrase Khoda Hafez (meaning ''May God be your Guardian'') is a

parting phrase A valediction ( derivation from Latin ''vale dicere'', "to say farewell"), parting phrase, or complimentary close in American English, is an expression used to say farewell, especially a word or phrase used to end a letter or message,

commonly used in across the

Greater Iran Greater Iran or Greater Persia ( ), also called the Iranosphere or the Persosphere, is an expression that denotes a wide socio-cultural region comprising parts of West Asia, the South Caucasus, Central Asia, South Asia, and East Asia (specifica ...

region, in languages including Persian,

, Azeri, and Kurdish. Furthermore, the term is also employed as a parting phrase in many languages across the

Indian subcontinent The Indian subcontinent is a physiographic region of Asia below the Himalayas which projects into the Indian Ocean between the Bay of Bengal to the east and the Arabian Sea to the west. It is now divided between Bangladesh, India, and Pakista ...

including

Urdu Urdu (; , , ) is an Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in South Asia. It is the Languages of Pakistan, national language and ''lingua franca'' of Pakistan. In India, it is an Eighth Schedule to the Constitution of Indi ...

, Punjabi, Deccani, Sindhi,

Hindi Modern Standard Hindi (, ), commonly referred to as Hindi, is the Standard language, standardised variety of the Hindustani language written in the Devanagari script. It is an official language of India, official language of the Government ...

, Bengali and Kashmiri. It also exists as a popular

loanword A loanword (also a loan word, loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language (the recipient or target language), through the process of borrowing. Borrowing is a metaphorical term t ...

, used for

in Turkish (''Hüdâ''), Bengali (খোদা), Hindi-Urdu (ख़ुदा, خُدا), Kazakh (''Xuda/Quda/Qudaı''), Uzbek (''Xudo''), Tatar (''Ходай''), Chinese ( along with ,), and other

and

Christian usage

In the

, Christians who speak

translate the word "God" as "Khuda" (خُدا) as God in Urdu is called Khuda, Although even Hindi speaking christians sometimes uses Khuda as a term to refer to God, though his personal name is rendered as " Yahovah" (यहोवा, یہوّاہ) or " Yahvah" (यहवा, یہوہ). Bible translations into Hindi and Urdu use these terms.

References

{{Reflist Names of God in Islam Names of God in Zoroastrianism ur:خدا

Etymology

Zoroastrian usage

Islamic usage

Christian usage

See also

References