| WHAT'S IN A NAME? Our Creator places a great deal of emphasis on His Name. He devoted a whole Command-ment to it (Exodus 20:7). He says it is holy and reverend (Psa. 111:9). He warns us against blaspheming His name (Lev. 24:16). It is used in the Old Testament alone about 7,000 times. Yet, men insist on following a tradition of man which was begun at about the time the Jews returned from Babylonian captivity. They decided the best way to avoid taking His name in vain, or to avoid blaspheming it, was to quit using it altogether. And so, that is what they did. When they would read the Scriptures and come to the Name YHWH, they would pronounce out loud the Hebrew word for Lord, which is Adonai, or in some cases, the Hebrew word for God, which is Elohim. It is generally agreed by Biblical authorities, and the Jews themselves, that this name, YHWH, was pronounced "YAHWEH." This is also borne out in the King James Version of Psalm 68:4, where we are told to praise Him by His name, JAH. Also, 4 times in the first 6 verses of Rev. 19, we find the word "Alleluia," which is the Greek?to?English transliteration of the Hebrew phrase, HalleluYAH." "HalleluYAH" is simply an untranslated Hebrew phrase that means, "Praise Ye Yah." Yah is the poetic or short form of the Name, YAHWEH. It could also be called the "family name," since our Saviour's name is YAHSHUA, meaning Yah's Salvation. See Matthew 1:21 And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name YAH?shua: for he shall save his peo-ple from their sins. You don't get this meaning out of the name, "Jesus." (If you have not read "The Missing 'J',"then write for your free copy today. It explains how the 'J' used to have the 'Y' sound, and still does in some languages.) Later, scribes wrote the vowels for "adonai" and "elohim" in the text of their scrolls, so the reader would read "YHWH," but know to pronounce "adonai," the LORD, or "elohim," GOD. When men began to translate the Bible into other languages, they didn't at first know what the Jews had done, so they combined ALL the letters from both words in the Name. This resulted in the word "Jehovah" coming into existence. This is a hybrid word that has been called a "grammatical impossibility" by scholars. Although "Jehovah" is still used in some translations of the scriptures, most simply use "the LORD" as a substitute for the NAME of the MOST HIGH. And that is exactly what it is ? a SUBSTITUTE! It is NOT a translation. Names are not translated. Names are TRANSLITERATED from one language to another. That means the same sounds are brought forth into the new language as exactly as possible. Most names in our English Bibles EXCEPT Yahweh's name were duly transliterated into English. Why is this? Many Bible forewords or prefaces explain that the translators followed a long?standing tradition by substituting "the LORD" for "the true Name of God." What did Yahshua say about following traditions of men? Mark 7:9: And he said unto them, Full well ye reject the commandment of YAHWEH, that ye may keep your own tradition. Mark 7:13: Making the word of YAHWEH of none effect through your tradi-tion, which ye have delivered: and many such like things do ye. To sum up, in each and every place in the King James Old Testament where you read "the LORD," with LORD in small caps, it was originally inspired by the Holy Spirit to be written YHWH, pronounced Yahweh. This was done no less than 6,823 times! Further, in about 130 places, "GOD" in small caps took the place of the original inspired "Yahweh." Are we pleasing our Father when we call Him by just any old name? Think about it. *** |