Revised as of
13 Jan 2023
I have such a fascination for words and that includes variations on words to get around such prohibitions as the Bible stating that thou shalt not use the Lord’s name in vain including every variation on the Lord, Jesus being one of them.
It’s led to a slew of mild swear words used by people everywhere, and you can view a list (that includes simple name variations based on one’s origins, i.e., Greek, Hebrew, etc.) in the entry on derivatives.
So, yes, there are times when one uses jesus in the lowercase and other times when Jesus has an initial capital letter.
Word Confusions . . .
. . . started as my way of dealing with a professional frustration with properly spelled words that were out of context in manuscripts I was editing as well as books I was reviewing. It evolved into a sharing of information with y’all. I’m hoping you’ll share with us words that have been a bête noire for you from either end.
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| jesus | Jesus |
|---|---|
‘Greg Hunt’ is Rhyming Slang For . . . is courtesy of SIZZLE. — OK, so there’s an exception to swearing a lowercase “jesus”. |
Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane and Christ on the Cross Inside Strasbourg Cathedral by Edwin Lee from inside the Cathedrale Notre Dame in Strasbourg, Germany, is under the CC BY 2.0 license, via Wikimedia Commons. — The two art pieces depict two events in the life of Jesus. |
| Part of Grammar: | |
| Exclamation
Always use an initial capital letter when using the phrase, Jesus Christ Plural: jesuses |
Noun; Proper Noun
Plural: Jesuses |
| [Sometimes offensive; slang] Used as an oath or strong expression of disbelief, dismay, awe, disappointment, pain, etc. | Noun: Generally used in a combined form Proper Noun: [Religious] A Jewish preacher and religious leader who became the central figure of the Christian religion [Religious] The author of the Apocryphal book of Ecclesiasticus, who lived in the 3rd century B.C. [Christian Science] The supreme example of God’s nature expressed through human beings |
| Examples: | |
| John! Jesus, can’t you do anything right.
Well for . . . jesus . . . what’d’ya go and do that for? Ah, jesus, look how much snow fell last night! |
Noun: Yeah, she used to wear these Jesus sandals. Wow, what a Jesus freak that guy is! “The Jesus movement was an Evangelical Christian movement beginning on the West Coast of the United States in the late 1960s and early 1970s and spreading primarily throughout North America, Europe, and Central America, before subsiding by the late 1980s” (Wikipedia). Proper Noun: Jesus of Nazareth died for our sins The belief in Jesus’ resurrection from the dead is the central tenet of Christianity. Some religions see Jesus as a Jew and Christ as God, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity while the Jews see Jesus as a Jewish rabbi. Jesus is a modern day translation for the author, Shimon ben Yeshua ben Eliezer ben Sira, who was the only writer who signed his work, The Book of Ecclesiasticus (a.k.a., the Wisdom of Sirach, Book of Sirach, or Sirach), which can be found in the Apocrypha, a hidden canon which should have been in the Old Testament. “Jesus beheld in Science the perfect man, who appeared to him where sinning mortal man appears to mortals” (Christian Science). Orbelin Pineda, Jesus Duenas, and Erick Gutierrez were at times brilliant with their quick and clever distribution in the midfield. Hey, Jesús, my man. Jesús Aguilar isn’t likely to send Eric Thames to a similar fate with the Brewers but the slugging first baseman has a way of coming up with big hits when given the chance. |
| Derivatives: | |
| Exclamation: gee, geez, geeze, jeepers, jeepers creepers, jeez, jeeze | Proper Noun: Iesu, Ihesu, Ihesus, Isa, Jehoshua, Jesu, Jesus Christ, Joshua, Yasu Yehoshua, Yeshu, Yeshua |
| History of the Word: | |
| Its first known use was in 1923. | Early Middle English, 1200-50, from the Late Latin Iēsus, which derived from the Greek Iēsoûs, which is from the Hebrew Yēshūaʿ, a syncopated variant of Yəhōshūaʿ meaning God is help.
In modern English, the variation, Jesus, was a result of the Great Vowel Shift in the 15th century when the letter J was first distinguished from I by the Frenchman Pierre Ramus in the 16th century. Early 17th century works such as the first edition of the King James Version of the Bible (1611) continued to print the name with an I even as Jesus became the common term in the 17th century. Jesu lingers in some more archaic texts. |
C’mon, get it out of your system, bitch, whine, moan . . . which words are your pet peeves? Also, please note that I try to be as accurate as I can, but mistakes happen or I miss something. Email me if you find errors, so I can fix them . . . and we’ll all benefit!
Satisfy your curiosity about other Word Confusions on its homepage or more generally explore the index of self-editing posts. You may also want to explore Book Layout & Formatting Ideas, Formatting Tips, Grammar Explanations, Linguistics, Publishing Tips, the Properly Punctuated, Writing Ideas and Resources, and Working Your Website.
Resources for jesus versus Jesus
Apple Dictionary.com
Dictionary.com: Jesus
Pinterest Photo Credits:
And Jesus Wept by MARELBU is under the CC BY 3.0 license, via Wikimedia Commons.
