Hand to God

[Karl Hagen]

Someone in an online forum asked about "hand to God" as an equivalent to
what she (and I) would say as "I swear to God" (i.e., a strong assertion
that something is true), asserting that she is suddenly hearing it a lot.

I hesitate to say that this is new (recency illusion and all that) but
it's certainly new to me. I don't see it in DARE, and a quick search of
Google Books turns up a lot of 19th century examples of "lift your hand
to God" and the like but nothing early with the "I swear" sense.

Is this an established regional term that is now spreading, or is it
really new?

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