Minced Oaths

 

On 7 May 2025, I posted Holy Smokes! about the white or black smoke which the Roman Catholic Cardinals in the Papal Conclave use to signal the status of the election of the next pope. The post mentioned minced oaths in discussing the situation and I promised to talk about that later. Well, here it is.

Minced oaths are phrases which can sound blasphemous but which are altered or disguised to be less explicit. They use indirect language, softened phrasing, or euphemisms. Think of the British exclamation Zounds!, which replaces God’s Wounds!  The usage also exists in other languages but is very extensive in the English-language. Examples include: dang, darn, dagnabbit, gadzooks, gee whillikers, jeepers, blimey, good heavens, Holy Moly, Holy Cow, Holy Mackerel, Great Scot, Golly, and many more. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Category:English_minced_oaths

 The idea of not saying the name of God out loud because of its sacredness is an ancient Jewish concept. When the holy name, the Tetragrammaton JHWH,  יהוה, occurs in their sacred texts, Jews still today substitute Adonai ,אֲדֹנָי , meaning Lord, or Ha-Shem, הַשֵּׁם, meaning the Name, or Elohim, אֱלֹהִים, meaning God.

Saying the holy name of God out loud is considered to be disrespectful, sacrilegious, and offensive. Many observant English-speaking Jews carry this even further, writing the word God as G-d.

James, the brother of Jesus, warned against the careless use of words. James 3:2-10. Being able to control one’s language is considered to be a sign of spiritual maturity.

For Pete's Sake!

“For Pete’s sake!  Would you please stop doing that?!”

“For Pete’s sake” is an idiomatic exclamation in English which expresses annoyance, irritation, or frustration with the actions of another person or with a situation.  It is considered to have originated as a substitute for “For Christ’s sake!” which many considered to be an irreverent use of the Lord’s name. This substitution is called a euphemism (from Ευφημία (Greek:  Eu: “good” or “true” plus phemi: “speech, speaking”).  The idea od the word is the opposite of the word “blasphemy.” (Βλασφημέω (Greek:  Blaspho: “I injure”).  A euphemism substitutes a mild, indirect, vague, neutral, or inoffensive word for one which is considered to be rude, harsh, blunt, offensive, profane, vulgar, uncomfortable, insensitive, socially unacceptable, or blasphemous.

“For Pete’s sake! ” instead of “For Christ’s sake!”  The derivation of this substitution is not at first obvious until you realize that “Pete” probably refers to Peter the Apostle.  Many Christians would still find this phrase to be offensive.

A few examples of English language euphemisms:

“Fallen asleep” or passed away” instead of “dead.”

“In trouble” instead of “pregnant.”

“Weiner” instead of “penis.”

“Getting laid” instead of “having sex.”

“Bloody” instead of “God’s Blood.”

“Dang” or “darn” ” instead of “damn.”

“Gosh” ” instead of “God.”

“Gee” ” instead of “Jesus.”

“What the heck?” instead of “What the Hell?”

“Rosebud” ” instead of “anus.”

“Pardon my French” instead of “Excuse my use of profanity.”

“Mary Jane” instead of “marijuana”

“SOB” instead of “son of a bitch.”

“Take a dump” instead of “defecate.”

“Drinking” instead of “consuming alcohol.”

“Visually impaired” instead of “blind.”

“Not the brightest light bulb” instead of “stupid.”

Although this particular post is English-specific, euphemisms are used in most, if not all, languages.  Many consider the Tetragrammaton, YHWH, to be a euphemism which is used to ensure that the holy name of God is not pronounced out loud because of its extreme holiness.  Jews regularly substitute the word “Adonai” (Lord) in place of YHWH.

"...put me on a cross ..."

Kristen Stewart, the star of the Twillight series of films is quoted about her fans in US Weekly for 28 June 2010 on page 14.

"I ... hope that I don't run off at the mouth and say something stupid they'd put me on a cross for."

Ms. Stewart meant no disrespect to Christianity. That was probably never in her mind. What her statement does reflect is the casual way in which our modern culture views religion and the sacred. There is little or no understanding of the holy.

In contrast, to the ancient Jews, the very name of God was too holy to even pronounce. When they came upon it in the uninterrupted strings of consonants in which their scriptures were written, they said "Lord" instead. When, later, vowel marks were devised and added to the texts, the vowels for adonai ("Lord") were added to the consonants HWHJ (Hebrew is read right to left, so we would see this as JHWH, the Tetragrammaton, commonly pronounced today as "Jahweh"). This combination of consonants and vowels was unpronounceable in Hebrew and was spoken as "Lord."

Centuries later, German translators misunderstood and transliterated the name as "Jehovah."