Glossary entry (derived from question below)
English term or phrase:
Elder or Senior God(dess)
Hindi translation:
parameshwar (male), parameshwari (female)
English term
Elder or Senior God(dess)
An Indian friend writes, “Female Goddesses are called "Devi". But for Goddesses like Durga, Parvati and Lakshmi we prefer to use Maa because they are "elder goddesses”.
He goes on to say that there are also three “elder gods” in Hinduism: “Brahma Jee Vishnu Jee and Shiv Jee.” As you can see, these are called “Jee”, while other gods such as the fire god (Agni Dev), the wind god (Pawan Dev) and the sun god (Surya Dev) are called Dev rather than Jee.
So, unless I misunderstand completely, you have 3 senior/elder gods and 3 senior/elder goddesses. My question: what is the Hindu term for these senior or elder gods and goddesses, please?
All the best,
Simon
Oct 11, 2008 11:36: changed "Kudoz queue" from "In queue" to "Public"
Oct 11, 2008 15:13: Nitin Goyal changed "Level" from "Non-PRO" to "PRO"
Oct 12, 2008 13:14: Anindita Basu (X) Created KOG entry
PRO (4): Vimal Panchal, Anindita Basu (X), Nitin Goyal, keshab
When entering new questions, KudoZ askers are given an opportunity* to classify the difficulty of their questions as 'easy' or 'pro'. If you feel a question marked 'easy' should actually be marked 'pro', and if you have earned more than 20 KudoZ points, you can click the "Vote PRO" button to recommend that change.
How to tell the difference between "easy" and "pro" questions:
An easy question is one that any bilingual person would be able to answer correctly. (Or in the case of monolingual questions, an easy question is one that any native speaker of the language would be able to answer correctly.)
A pro question is anything else... in other words, any question that requires knowledge or skills that are specialized (even slightly).
Another way to think of the difficulty levels is this: an easy question is one that deals with everyday conversation. A pro question is anything else.
When deciding between easy and pro, err on the side of pro. Most questions will be pro.
* Note: non-member askers are not given the option of entering 'pro' questions; the only way for their questions to be classified as 'pro' is for a ProZ.com member or members to re-classify it.
Proposed translations
parameshwar (male), parameshwari (female)
I do not agree with the explanation of your friend regarding Jee/Maata being reserved for "elder" gods. Hanuman is routinely called HanumanJee, for example, and avatars such as Rama are called RamachandraJee or RamJee, never ever Hanuman Dev or RamDev. Similarly, Ganga is always called Ma Ganga. As far as I know, gods and goddesses of the Hindu pantheon are not elder/juinor but manifestations of a particular aspect.
Dev, literally, means "the shining one" and its adjective form is "divya". Gods such as Agni, Pawan and Surya belong to the Rig Vedic times when gods such as Brahma, Vishnu and Mahesh had not yet attained their "present" forms. During the Rig Vedic times, almost all gods were referred to as "shining".
India
BEST deal for Quality Translations
Native in: Gujarati 
Works in: English to Gujarati, Gujarati to English, English to Hindi, and 1 more.
Param Pita (Supreme God) or Param Mata (Supreme Goddess)
* All DEVs, DEVIs are under control of senior GODs / GODDESSes, who are more like SUPREME Gods, viz. BRAHMA, VISHNU and MAHESH. They are the elder Gods as you said. The supreme deities could be referred as PARAM PITA (Supreme Father), PARAM MATA (Supreme Mother) in Hindi.
Hope this clarifies your point. Please feel free to ask for any more clarifications.
--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 56 mins (2008-10-11 12:32:44 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------
BRAHMA Jee's wives GAYATRI Ma, SAVITRI Ma;
VISHNU Jee's wife LAXMI Ma;
MAHESH Jee's wife PARVATI Ma.
Ma is a short form of MATA. Aforesaid MATAs are example of Supreme Mothers
ब्रह्मा-विष्णु-महेश्वर
They have their wives too who are the senior/supreme goddess. They are : Brahma- Saraswatee ( goddess of education), Vishnu- Lakshmi (goddess of wealth) Mahashwar- Parvati (goddess of power(शक्ति). According to Hinduism all these six control mankind and the universe.
Something went wrong...