Some also use the reduced variant of God bless. God bless you has been attested as a leave-taking term since 1740 and can be today heard in the US as an explicit wish or blessing and as an implicit leave-taking term. Alternative responses to sneezing exist in various languages. In some cultures, sneezing is seen as a sign of good fortune or God's beneficence. Moreover, in the past some people may have thought that the heart stops beating during a sneeze, and that the phrase 'God bless you' encourages the heart to continue beating. The Irish Folk story 'Master and Man' by Thomas Crofton Croker, collected by William Butler Yeats, describes this variation. In these cases, 'God bless you' or 'bless you' is used as a sort of shield against evil. Some have offered an explanation suggesting that people once held the folk belief that a person's soul could be thrown from their body when they sneezed, that sneezing otherwise opened the body to invasion by the Devil or evil spirits, or that sneezing was the body's effort to force out an invading evil presence. Part of his command was that anyone sneezing be blessed immediately ('God bless you'), since sneezing was often the first sign that someone was falling ill with the plague.' By AD 750, it became customary to say 'God bless you' as a response to one sneezing. National Geographic reports that during the Roman Plague of 590, ' Pope Gregory I ordered unceasing prayer for divine intercession. It is what we are to receive from God and then give to another. You invoke God on their behalf to support the good that you will for them. So we naturally say, 'God bless you.' You can bless someone when you will their good under the invocation of God. It always involves God, because when you will the good of another person, you realize only God is capable of bringing that. It's the actual putting forth of your will for the good of another person. In the periodical Christianity Today, the philosopher Dallas Willard wrote: īlessing is the projection of good into the life of another.

In the Aaronic blessing, 'Invoking the name of the Lord in this benediction transferred the name, the identity and presence, of God onto his people.' While used by clergy in Christian liturgy (especially during the benediction), the phrase 'God bless you' is regularly used among believers with one another, who call upon God to grant the recipient of the phrase favour and protection.

Son and the Holy Spirit, bless and keep us.The locution 'God bless you' is used in Christian benedictions.

May the almighty and merciful Lord, the Father, the Lighten our darkness, Lord, we pray and in your mercy defend us from all perils and dangers of this night for the love of your only Son, our Saviour, Jesus Christ. Which you have prepared in the sight of every people Īntiphon: Preserve us, O Lord, while waking, and guard us while sleeping, that awake we may watch with Christ, and asleep we may rest in peace. Now, Lord, you let your servant go in peace * Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit.Īntiphon: Preserve us, O Lord,* while waking, and guard us while sleeping, that awake we may watch with Christ, and asleep we may rest in peace. Into your hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit.įor you have redeemed me, Lord God of truth. Cast all your anxieties on him, for he cares about you. Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that in due time he may exalt you. In your presence there is fullness of joy,Īnd in your right hand are pleasures for evermore.Īntiphon: My body shall rest in hope. Nor take the names of their gods upon my lips.ĥ O Lord, you are my portion and my cup *Ħ My boundaries enclose a pleasant land *ħ I will bless the Lord who gives me counsel *īecause he is at my right hand I shall not fall.ĩ My heart, therefore, is glad, and my spirit rejoices *ġ0 For you will not abandon me to the grave,* Upon those who are noble among the people.Ĥ Their libations of blood I will not offer,* I have said to the Lord, 'You are my Lord,Ģ All my delight is upon the godly that are in the land,* Glory be to the Father and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit *Īs it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end.ġ Protect me, O God, for I take refuge in you * The Lord Almighty grant us a quiet night and a perfect end.

The lord bless you and keep you