[Avodah] City named after AZ

[Dov Kay]

Having asking the question, shuv ra'iti that R. Y.H. Henkin in Bnei Vonim, III, siman 35, page 119 (accessible online at http://hebrewbooks.org/pdfpager.aspx?req=20024&pgnum=119) deals with it. He concludes:  1) there is no prohibition on saying the names of streets or cities with names such as Christchurch, as they are mere names;   2) yesh l'lamed z'chus on those who say the word Xmas (although it is best to refrain from doing so) because it is now used by the great majority of nochrim to refer to a holiday, rather than a holy day on which a mass is held in honour of their saviour. The gist of his ruling, as I understand it, is that where we are not pronouncing the name of the deity itself and it is a "shem b'alma", there is no prohibition involved as we are not giving any honour to the deity.  As already mentioned by other posters, if it is the name of deity which is mentioned in Tanach or is no longer served, it is also permitted.  
 On a humorous note, in the course of his teshuva, R. Henkin refers to a brand of canned fish on sale in Israel called Neptune which carried the hechsher of the Badatz Machzikei Hadass.  Clearly it couldn't be forbidden!  
 
R. Henkin also rules that it is permitted to say the name Jesus (without "Christ").  One may also say San Francisco or St Louis, because that it what the cities are now called, and no-one would misunderstand this as an attribution of saintliness Francis or Louis. 
 
Kol tuv  
Dov Kay
 
 
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