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Heather Walts: When Greeting, at a Loss for Words

UMass Amherst Linguistics BA Heather Walts is living in Pakistan. Below is her latest report for WHISC. Visit her weblog Updates from Heather for much more on life in Pakistan and environs.

Christian Greetings --- at a loss for words

I've found during my time here that I never know what to say when greeting Pakistani Christians. Muslims use the Arabic greeting, assalaam alaikum (may the peace of Allah be upon on) and it's response is wa alaikum assalaam (and may the peace of Allah also be upon you). In the Arab world it's fine to use this greeting pattern with both Christians and Muslims, and the word in Arabic for the one God is Allah. Christians will use the same word when referring to God as they will also use Isa (Jesus). In Pakistan it's a different story.

The greeting used by Hindu Hindi-Urdu speakers is namaste, but in Pakistan this greeting is looked down upon. To say namaste means that you are an idol worshiper and an infidel, so this greeting is generally avoided. Also, most Urdu speakers insist that Hindi is a completely different language than Urdu because they use different writing systems and there is some variation in lexicon. They claim they can understand Hindi easily because they watch so many Hindi movies.

So namaste is out for the Christians as well, and as opposed to Arabic speaking Christians, Allah is not an acceptable word for God. Why? Well because xuda is the word for God used by Pakistani Christians and Allah refers only to the god of the Muslims whom they believe to be a false god. Christians also do not believe that worship and prayer must be done through the Arabic tongue, as Muslims believe, so the rejection of assalaam alaikum as a greeting is prevalent among the Christian community.

What do Christians say to greet each other? Sometimes salaam (Arabic- peace) is used all by itself, or with a person's title. Salaam khala (peace; maternal aunt). This is interesting because they are still using an Arabic word for greeting others. Some Christians use English greetings like hello, good morning, good afternoon, good evening, and how are you? I thought this may be done by those within the church who are educated, but I've observed some Christians who are illiterate Punjabi speakers using English greetings as well.

When it comes to partings there is a similar problem. For Hindi speakers namaste doubles as a parting as well, but again since Muslims and Christians don't want to be thought of as idol worshipers or infidels, this parting is out. Urdu textbooks will teach xuda hafiz (may God protect you), but some Muslims have gone to change this greeting to allah hafiz. I once heard a Christian woman's son use allah hafiz and he was promptly reprimanded and told never to say that again. The Arabic parting m9-salama (with peace) doesn't seem to be used at all in Pakistan, although due to the meaning it seems this would create less controversy. Most Muslims don't mind if you say xuda hafiz and they seem to alternate between using xuda and allah when they refer to God. A zealot of fanatic will almost always insist of using allah exclusively but these kind of people I have only seen on TV and not encountered in person.

So what do I say? Well for greetings I use salaam alaikum unless I am with people who I know are Christians. Then I switch to salaam and English greetings. For partings, I exclusively use xuda hafiz because if I use allah hafiz everyone will assume I am a Muslim. Now with Ismailis (a sect of Shiia Islam) greetings are a different story altogether ...

September 28, 2006 12:06 AM | 04:23 (2006-09-28) , alums , undergrad news