smiddy And while they admit "Yahweh" is more the correct
pronunciation of the tetragrammaton they omit YHWH as representing those
four letters.
You need to keep in mind that the tetragrammaton was written in Hebrew, not in Latin or English which alphabets came later. So, when translating from one alphabet to another you sometimes have a choice of letters to use to give the equivalent sound.
The first letter of the tetragrammaton is the Hebrew yod, and gave rise to the Greek iota and the Latin I/J. When Jesus said (in Matthew 5:18 AV) that "one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law", the word jot referred to the Hebrew yod which is the smallest letter in the Hebrew alphabet. Likewise, the third letter of the tetragrammaton is the Hebrew waw, which can be represented in English as the first letter/sound in vote or wall.
Furthermore, while it may be that Yahweh is an approximation of the Hebrew tetragrammaton, we are reading an English translation and when the Bible was first translated into English by Tyndale he used the name Iehouah, probably based on the Latin although he may have come up with it himself as an English equivalent.
jhine the fact remains that the Gospel writers and Paul did not use the Divine name and they must have had their reasons .
Perhaps. I have been convinced that in some cases that is true of Paul. Basically, the argument is that there are no NT manuscripts earlier than the second century and that all copies of the LXX which contain the tetragrammaton or Greek equivalent are earlier than the second century. So, for some reason which is open to debate the name of God was removed from the Christian LXX and it is reasoned that the same happened to copies made of the Gospels and Paul's letters.
Also, slimboyfat has made the point that the NT mss that we do have present Lord (kyrios) and God (theos) as sacred names, so just the first and last letters of the name, e.g. KY for kyrios, which some have suggested arose when God's name was replaced. The evidence is not compelling but this together with the changes in the LXX do make a good case.
Further, as far as translation goes, provided the reader is told why 'Jehovah' is included, he can make his own judgements when reading the text. In my opinion, it is far more pernicious to replace God's name throughout the Bible with 'Lord' because that is what orthodox Jews read when they see the name.