science

Reverential capitalization

Reverential capitalization is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Reverential capitalization rather than just read about it. In short: Reverential capitalization is the practice of capitalizing religious words that refer to deities or divine beings in cases where the words would not otherwise have been capitalized. Pronouns are also particularly included in reverential capitalization: and God calleth to the light 'Day,' and to the darkness He hath called 'Night;' and there is an evening, and there is a morning — day one.

Key takeaways

Reverential capitalization belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Reverential capitalization to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Reverential capitalization from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Reverential capitalization is the practice of capitalizing religious words that refer to deities or divine beings in cases where the words would not otherwise have been capitalized. Pronouns are also particularly included in reverential capitalization:

and God calleth to the light 'Day,' and to the darkness He hath called 'Night;' and there is an evening, and there is a morning — day one. In this example, the proper name "God", like "Day" and "Night", is capitalized and the pronoun "He" is a reverential capitalization. While proper names are capitalized universally, reverence for any particular divinity is not universal. In short, when pronouns that are usually lowercase are capitalized, this usually implies that the author personally reveres and regards as a deity the antecedent of that pronoun. Nouns used as titles for a deity may also be capitalized. Examples include "the Lord", "the Father" and "the Creator".

Capitalizing nouns Capitalization, punctuation and spelling were not well standardized in Early Modern English. For example, the 1611 King James Bible (KJV) did not capitalize pronouns:

For our heart shall rejoice in him, because we have trusted in his holy name. In the 17th and 18th centuries, it became common to capitalize all nouns, as is still done in some other Germanic languages, including German. In languages that capitalize all nouns, reverential capitalization of the first two letters or the whole word can sometimes be seen. The following is an example of a Christian creed in Danish, which capitalized nouns until 1948.

Vi troe paa en eeneste GUD, en almægtig Skaber af alle Ting, saavel synlige som u-synlige, og paa en HErre JEsum Christum, GUds eeneste Søn, fød af Faderen[...] (Translation) We believe in the one and only GOD, an almighty Creator of all Things, visible as well as invisible, and in a LOrd JEsus Christ, GOd's only Son, born of the Father[...] Note that some instances are in all capitals (e.g., GUD "GOD"), and some begin with two capital letters (e.g., HErre "LOrd" and JEsum "JEsus"). Some words that refer to persons of the Christian Trinity begin with a single capital (e.g., Skaber "Creator", Christum "Christ", and Faderen "the Father"), but so do all other nouns (e.g., Ting "Things"). This type of reverential capitalization varies within a single sentence and would also be dependent on the author and the publisher of a work. The convention of capitalizing all nouns was eventually abandoned in English; especially influential in this was Benjamin Blayney, who produced a 1769 edition of the King James Bible in which nouns were not capitalized—possibly simply to save space on the printed page. Capitalization of deities is also customarily applied in religious texts written in Tagalog and other Philippine languages. This is despite the practice being considered non-standard and inconsistent by purists, who contend it applies only to English.

Capitalizing pronouns In the 19th century, it became common to capitalize pronouns referring to the God of the Abrahamic religions to show reverence:

For in Him doth our heart rejoice, For in His holy name we have trusted. An interesting early case is Handel's 1741 oratorio Messiah, whose printed libretto and published score both use lowercase pronouns but whose conductor's holograph consistently capitalizes them.

…day of His coming … when He appeareth" In the 20th century, this practice became far less common:

For our heart rejoices in him, because we have trusted in his holy name. Today, there is no widely accepted rule in English on whether or not to use reverential capitalization. Different house styles have different rules, which are given by their style manuals. The Christian Writer's Manual of Style, the Chicago Manual of Style, and the Associated Press Stylebook do not recommend it. In contrast, reverential capitalization was prescribed by the United States Government Publishing Office's style manual of 2008. Reverential capitalization is also used in the 21st Century King James Version and Biblehub's King James Purple Letter Edition.

See also Nomina sacra – Christian scribal practice Royal we – Use of a first-person plural pronoun to refer to a single person

References

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Reverential capitalization

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Reverential capitalization claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Reverential capitalization before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Reverential capitalization ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Reverential capitalization

In research: Reverential capitalization appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Reverential capitalization in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Reverential capitalization is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Capitalization, Christian symbols, Orthography, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Reverential capitalization outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Reverential capitalization in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Reverential capitalization means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Reverential capitalization out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Reverential capitalization in simple terms?

Why does Reverential capitalization matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Reverential capitalization?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Reverential capitalization.