God

CRITICAL, DISTINCT STRATEGY FROM OTHER LANGUAGES IN THIS PIPELINE: established Tamil Bible tradition (the Tamil Old Version and many hymns) actually uses தேவன் for “God” throughout, e.g. John 3:16. But தேவன் literally denotes “a deva” — one deity among the many devas of the Hindu pantheon — risking a henotheistic or polytheistic reading of the one true God as merely one deva among others. Rather than retain தேவன் with a mandatory gloss (the strategy this pipeline’s Punjabi Language Package uses for a comparably entrenched term), this Language Package deliberately breaks from that translation precedent and uses கடவுள் instead, a term whose folk etymology (“the one beyond time/reach,” from கடத்தல்) carries no pantheon-membership implication and is unambiguously monotheistic. NEVER பரமேஸ்வரன் (an epithet of Shiva) or பகவான் (generic Hindu devotional “Lord”).