Which is correct: Dios les bendiga or Dios los bendiga?

Question

Que Dios les bendiga en esta Navidad.

Answer 1

Y que Dios te dendiga también!

To answer your question, they both are correctly translated as "May God bless you (plural formal)". In Spain, "les" is used as the masc. plural direct object meaning "you", whereas in Latin America "los" is used in that capacity.

Answer 2

Que Dios los bendiga is correct but if you are one to use leísmo a Ustedes then you could say les. Although I guess leísmo is a hotly debated topic and technically it is not really correct to use.

Answer 3

But it appears to be used both ways. Google the phrase "Dios los bendiga" in quotes and you receive 2,270,000 results.

Do the same for "Dios les bendiga" and you receive 13,900,000.

Wow Goyo. Though all my textbooks and maybe the RAE say les is not correct here, 13.9 million is hard to ignore!
I found this about leísmo link text

Interesting, but I am too scared to use it and I will stick to lo hehe.

And in case you every make a mistake, you can claim to be using leísmo and thereby explain it away. ;) - MacFadden, AGO 13, 2010

Answer 4

Las dos formas son correctas pero ''Dios les bendiga'' es mas antigua se usa mas ''Dios los bendiga''

Hola, y bienvenido al foro. Gracias por su contribución. - MacFadden, AGO 13, 2010

Answer 5

At least everyone agrees that the los/les is a direct object pronoun in this context. Just to confirm it, let me point out that bendecir is a transitive verb so there must be a direct object.

Answer 6

Interesting question. I would say we're dealing with a direct object pronoun rather than an indirect object pronoun. So to me, it has to be "los", and I'm relieved to see dandi say the same thing.

But it appears to be used both ways. Google the phrase "Dios los bendiga" in quotes and you receive 2,270,000 results.

Do the same for "Dios les bendiga" and you receive 13,900,000.