Jehovah or Yahweh?

by undercover 42 Replies latest watchtower bible

  • Leolaia
    Leolaia
    Names do not change from language to language. One can listen to a foreign broadcast and recognize names of world leaders such as Bush, Yeltsin, Kohl, and Mitterand. Names are transliterated ("given the same sound") by employing equivalent letters of a given alphabet.

    Names very often do change from language to language. In many cases the spelling of a name becomes fairly fixed and is pronounced differently by speakers of different languages, for whom the letters have different phonetic values. Thus Jesus is pronounced Hay-Soos in Spanish or Gee-zis in English, while the original Semitic Yeshwa' had neither of these consonants or vowels. Think also of names of foreign countries or cities that often have very different pronunciations around the world (e.g. the Swedish city Gothenburg which English-speakers might pronounce Gah-then-burg, German-speakers might pronounce Goh-ten-boorg, but which the Swedes themselves pronounce Yö-te-boh-ry). Second, because of differing phonetic systems, transliterations are usually inexact (remember Peking as the transliteration for the city currently transliterated Beijing?), and this is evident again in the transliteration of Semitic Yeshwa' into Greek and Latin which involved the loss of the coda consonant 'ayin. A simple comparison between the forms of Hebrew OT names in the Greek NT can easily show this to be the case.

    The development from a theoretical Yahweh to the modern Jehovah is complex because it involves not just transliteration but also influence from other Hebrew words. The amount of divergence between Jehovah and Yahweh also varies according to one's language; in German, the initial /j/ is pronounced as glide [y] (same as in Yahweh) while in English, the same letter is pronounced as an affricate J. The insertion of the vowels from adonay and elohim played a role in altering the pronunciation of YHWH, but considering how pliable foreign names are, I fail to see how this is supposedly worse than the changes wrought by transliteration. The latter can include the deletion of consonants, metathesis, change of vowel values, and errors mistaking one consonant for another. Gee-zis seems to me to be as distorted a name as Geh-ho-vah; the latter is different only in involving one additional means of phonetic drift. Also: (1) "Iesus" is a transliteration, not translation, into the Latin alphabet of the Greek name Iésous, which itself is a transliteration of an Aramaic name. Spelling it with a "J" is a relatively modern development, going back at least to the 1629 KJV (before that, it was spelled "Iesus"). (2) Jesus is not a purely transliterated name either. Consider the final consonant -s in Jesus. This is the nominative case ending in Greek and Latin, which did not appear in other grammatical forms of the name (which varied according to case). In English, this -s has been fossilized as part of the name itself, occuring regardless of case, even though it was not originally part of the base in either Greek or Latin. If Jehovah is a hybrid incorporating elements from other words, Jesus is a hybrid as well -- incorporating a grammatical suffix that was not originally part of the name.

  • whyamihere
    whyamihere

    I say God....its weird because I used to pray with Jehovah's name...Now I am like ....God? and no not God are you there its me Brooke!

    Brooke

  • undercover
    undercover

    What it boils down to is that it's just not as simple as taking someone's Bible and turning to Psalm 83:18 and saying, "Here's God's name. And by the way, only Jehovah's Witnesses use God's name."

    When you start to research it just a little past the "Knowledge Book" or the "Divine Name" brochure you realize that there are all kinds of debates and opinions and thoughts on just what God's name is and how it has been changed over the years. There are many more people out there that know more about God's name and the origins of it than a few old geezers in New York.

    Anyone talking with JWs or studying with them needs to know about this information and they'll see that it's not as simple and easy as JWs make it out to be. That should raise a flag that maybe these people either aren't on the up and up or they have been mislead themselves.

    Edited to add: I grew up as a JW and I never questioned the origin of God's name. I've learned more about God' name this morning from reading the Internet and searching this site and reading your posts than I ever did in 30 some years of being a JW.

  • Narkissos
    Narkissos

    Leaving the pronunciation aside, was Yhwh ever "God's name"?

    It was the name of the patron god (lower case intended) of Judah / Israel, when this god was thought of as one among many (polytheism).

    A good example is Judges 11:24f, provided we don't muddle the text with unwarranted "LORD"s and capital "God"s to obfuscate the obvious parallelism between the gods Yhwh and Chemosh:

    So now Yhwh, the god of Israel, has conquered the Amorites for the benefit of his people Israel. Do you intend to take their place? Should you not possess what your god Chemosh gives you to possess? And should we not be the ones to possess everything that Yhwh our god has conquered for our benefit?

    Now when Israel officially replaces its belief in its patron god with the belief in a universal God (monotheism), what's the use of a divine name? None. Instead this traditional name becomes an embarrassing inheritance, recalling the polytheistic ("pagan") roots of monotheism. So the traditional name is explained away with a theological abstraction ("I am what I am", Exodus 3), and withdrawn from practical use (substitution with adonaï / elohim in Hebrew, with kurios / theos in Greek). But the repressed popular belief comes back, in ancient magical use (as attested in papyrii) or in very late resurgences, such as the JW sect.

    Philo is a good example of how a monotheist Jew viewed the idea of "God's name" in the early 1st century. He writes (in The Change of Names) something very similar to what poppers wrote above:

    II. (7) Do not, however, think that the living God, he who is truly living, is ever seen so as to be comprehended by any human being; for we have no power in ourselves to see any thing, by which we may be able to conceive any adequate notion of him; we have no external sense suited to that purpose (for he is not an object which can be discerned by the outward sense), nor any strength adequate to it: therefore, Moses, the spectator of the invisible nature, the man who really saw God (for the sacred scriptures say that he entered "into the Darkness," by which expression they mean figuratively to intimate the invisible essence), having investigated every part of every thing, sought to see clearly the much-desired and only God; (8) but when he found nothing, not even any appearance at all resembling what he had hoped to behold; he, then, giving up all idea of receiving instruction on that point from any other source, flies to the very being himself whom he was seeking, and entreats him, saying, "Show my thyself that I may see thee so as to know Thee." But, nevertheless, he fails to obtain the end which he had proposed to himself, and which he had accounted the most all-sufficient gift for the most excellent race of creation, mankind, namely a knowledge of those bodies and things which are below the living God. (9) For it is said unto him, "Thou shalt see my back parts, but my face shall not be beheld by Thee." As if it were meant to answer him: Those bodies and things which are beneath the living God may come within thy comprehension, even though every thing would not be at once comprehended by thee, since that one being is not by his nature capable of being beheld by man. (10) And what wonder is there if the living God is beyond the reach of the comprehension of man, when even the mind that is in each of us is unintelligible and unknown to us? Who has ever beheld the essence of the soul? the obscure nature of which has given rise to an infinite number of contests among the sophists who have brought forward opposite opinions, some of which are inconsistent with any kind of nature. (11) It was, therefore, quite consistent with reason that no proper name could with propriety be assigned to him who is in truth the living God. Do you not see that to the prophet who is really desirous of making an honest inquiry after the truth, and who asks what answer he is to give to those who question him as to the name of him who has sent him, he says, "I am that I Am," which is equivalent to saying, "It is my nature to be, not to be described by name:" (12) but in order that the human race may not be wholly destitute of any appellation which they may give to the most excellent of beings, I allow you to use the word Lord as a name; the Lord God of three natures--of instruction, and of holiness, and of the practice of virtue; of which Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob are recorded as the symbols. For this, says he, is the everlasting name, as if it has been investigated and discerned in time as it exists in reference to us, and not in that time which was before all time; and it is also a memorial not placed beyond recollection or intelligence, and again it is addressed to persons who have been born, not to uncreated natures. (13) For these men have need of the complete use of the divine name who come to a created or mortal generation, in order that, if they cannot attain to the best thing, they may at least arrive at the best possible name, and arrange themselves in accordance with that; and the sacred oracle which is delivered as from the mouth of the Ruler of the universe, speaks of the proper name of God never having been revealed to any one, when God is represented as saying, "For I have not shown them my Name;" for by a slight change in the figure of speech here used, the meaning of what is said would be something of this kind: "My proper name I have not revealed to them," but only that which is commonly used, though with some misapplication, because of the reasons abovementioned. (14) And, indeed, the living God is so completely indescribable, that even those powers which minister unto him do not announce his proper name to us. At all events, after the wrestling match in which the practicer of virtue wrestled for the sake of the acquisition of virtue, he says to the invisible Master, "Tell me thy Name;" but he said, "Why askest thou me my name?" And he does not tell him his peculiar and proper name, for says he, it is sufficient for thee to be taught my ordinary explanations. But as for names which are the symbols of created things, do not seek to find them among immortal natures.
  • Gerard
    Gerard
    Re: Jehovah or Yahweh?

    Potato'h or potayto ?

  • stillajwexelder
    stillajwexelder

    I agree that Jehovah is not the divine name - too modern - but Jesus is not the name of the son of God either by the same logic - Yeheshua would be better

  • z
    z

    Ok my first lang is Hebrew

    In Hebrew there is no sound of J however there is ga so why not gahove ? the Jew trough the centuries pray in Hebrew and so is today the Sfaridim kept the lang at home and was spoken in secret this BS of the WT that to Jew don?t know their god name its just another joke . thug the name was holly but if you read Hebrew you can pronouns it .the oldest written god?s name is fond in the red see scroll

    Sfaridim are the people who lived in the Middle East north Africa

    Z

  • Justin
    Justin

    Over the years it has occurred to me that, on the one hand, the Society would seem today to be much more authentic if it named its people "Yahweh's Witnesses," but, on the other, there seems to be no point in their history where such a change could have been easily made. The name "Yahweh" has been popularized only recently, and if the JW religion seemed too foreign (by being completely different from conventional Christianity) it could not gain converts. The form "Jehovah" was actually more popular until its adoption into the name of the Watch Tower religion.

    True, "Jehovah" occurs only four times in the King James Version, and is three times used in combination names (such as Jehovah-jireh). It is used consistently in the American Standard Version of 1901. I recall coming across in a library a copy of the Psalms which had been translated and used by the Puritans, and it frequently used the name Jehovah (but not with consistency - sometimes the substitutionary "Lord" would occur). And then, surprisingly, the Society was familiar with the translation by Joseph B. Rotherham during Russell's lifetime - and that translation had "Yahweh." So it's not as though they didn't know about "Yahweh." But would this form have been at all familiar to people in 1931 when the new name was adopted? And then, as they gained a reputation as "Jehovah's Witnesses," they couldn't change. It would have amounted to starting all over again. It's as though they have been caught between a rock and a hard place.

  • Neo
    Neo

    Hi Nathan, nice to see you around.

    Neo

  • Narkissos
    Narkissos
    In Hebrew there is no sound of J however there is ga so why not gahove ?

    The first letter of the name is yod, not gimel.

    But you're making me curious: how do you say (and pronounce) Jehovah's witnesses in modern Hebrew? Something like 'edim she-l-Yehova or 'ede Yehova?

Share this

Google+
Pinterest
Reddit