Spelling guidance from a top language institute breaks with tradition, clerics argue
Writing the word ‘God’ with a lowercase letter is sinful and disrespectful, clerics from the Russian Orthodox Church have said, responding to new spelling guidelines issued by Russia’s leading linguistic authority.
In comments to the media on Friday, the Vinogradov Russian Language Institute, which operates under the Russian Academy of Sciences, stated that while ‘God’ should be capitalized in religious texts, lowercase usage is acceptable in everyday expressions such as “thank God” or “for the love of God.”
In an interview with Abzats Media, Archpriest Alexander Ilyashenko argued that using the lowercase ‘g’ reflects a lingering influence of Soviet-era atheist ideology.
“In my opinion, this is a sin, an expression of disrespect and ingratitude to the Lord,” he said. “It is very sad that some scientists have [the opposite] opinion. I think it is unacceptable.”
Father Alvian Tkhelidze, a priest and prominent religious blogger, said the traditional Russian usage calls for capitalization even in idiomatic phrases.
“For Christians, saying ‘thank God’ is not a stock phrase, but an act of honoring the Creator,” he wrote on Telegram.
On Saturday, Archpriest Vladimir Vigilyansky, rector of the Church of Saint Tatiana at Moscow State University, also criticized the recommendation. He insisted that the word ‘God’ should be capitalized even in common expressions, adding that lowercase usage is only appropriate when referring to pagan gods.
Some Russian writers, including Fyodor Dostoevsky, used the lowercase spelling in their literary works.
Anastasia Solomonova, dean of the Philology Faculty at the Pushkin State Russian Language Institute, noted that lowercase usage became more common after the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution – not only due to atheist propaganda, but because Soviet authorities no longer recognized the Christian God as a supreme authority.
In 2022, the Russian Education Ministry issued guidance recommending capitalization of the terms such as ‘God,’ ‘Lord,’ ‘Holy Trinity,’ ‘Holy Ghost,’ ‘Creator,’ ‘Church,’ and ‘Providence’ when used in a religious context.
