Is There A Proof That God's Name Is Jehovah And Not Yahweh?
Question: What is the difference between the name Yahweh and Jehovah? Why do Jehovah Witnesses call God Jehovah? Do we have clues how to pronounce 'YHWH' in any way?
Answer: Greetings in Jesus wonderful name!
Yahweh is a a form of the Hebrew name of God used in the Bible. The name came to be regarded by Jews ( c. 300 BC) as too sacred to be spoken, and the vowel sounds are uncertain. Because of the above Jewish belief we have seen above, it was forbidden to write the name of God at all in the Biblical Old Testament period, and it could only be spoken once per year on Yom Kippur after the people had been cleansed from their sins.
Because the Jewish Scribe who are copiers of Scripture felt that the name of God was so special, and so powerful, that no one could truly use God's name casually during the intertestmental period of Israel, around 500 BC, the Jews became very concerned with not blaspheming the name of the Lord or accidentally taking the name of God in vain (Leviticus 24:16; Exo 20:7), so they never used it except for one day each year on Yom Kippur when they spoke it 7 times in a Temple ceremony called Yom Kippur (Lev 16:1-34), the Day of Atonement after which they were never allowed to write it down, so they used "JHWH" as God's name without vowels. So when they wrote His name they used 4 initials to represent it. So rather than saying the name 'Yahweh', they would say Elohim instead, which is the Hebrew word for God. However, this did not solve the problem of what to do when one came across the name Yahweh during the reading of the Scriptures.
Limitation Of Expression In Hebrew But Liberty Of Devotion Is Hidden In It
Hebrew is written with only the consonant letters. The pronunciation of the words were passed down from generation to generation verbally. When the Temple was destroyed around 70 AD, the Yom Kippur ritual was changed and God’s name was not spoken again. Scholars roughly say that the way it was was spoken was eventually lost to the memory of man in about 300 AD.
So we cannot know for sure the original pronunciation through which the Israelites called the name of God.
Yahweh, the god of the Israelites, whose name was revealed to Moses as four Hebrew consonants (YHWH) called the tetragrammaton. ... Thus, the tetragrammaton became the artificial Latinized name Jehovah (JeHoWaH).
Taking, Exodus 3:13-14 in which the word 'I AM' is 'ehyeh' of Hebrew in to consideration, which leads many scholars to believe that the best translation of YHWH is "He is" or "the Eternal" which is an additional idea of ever continuing action mixed in without end. God introduced Himself to Abraham as El-Shaddai ("God Almighty"). It is a mistake to think that YHWH is God's exclusive name or His only real name.
Why do Jehovah Witnesses call God Jehovah?
Jehovah's Witnesses emphasize the use of God's name, and they prefer and adopted the form Jehovah — a vocalization of God's name based on the Tetragrammaton. They believe that Jehovah is the only true God, the creator of all things, and the Universal Sovereign, even though it is a mispronounciation of the tetragrammaton that later became the artificial Latinized name Jehovah (JeHoWaH). These people continued using the name Jehovah for their cult and therefore became secluded from the main stream Christianity and also tresspassed in to forbidden areas of false doctrine and blasphemy in Christology which is the basis of classical true Christianity.
Is it improper to use the name Jehovah or Yahweh?
I believe that because Jehovah is artificial Latinized name and Yahweh is a a form of the Hebrew name of God, it was all human tradition that brought in these names, and it has nothing to do with God and His word (Mark 7:13). Some, such as the Jehovah's Witnesses, object to using LORD in place of YHWH. However, they are ignoring God's own translation of His name 'The Lord' (Deut 6:5; Matt 22:37). The Septuagint version translated the Hebrew scriptures into Greek. It was done about 200 B.C. in that translation the word YHWH was translated to the Greek word kurios ("Lord"). Jesus used the Greek word kurios ("lord") to translate YHWH which gives us a idea that these writers were inspired of God. This is done consistently in the New Testament, which is inspired by God. Hence, God has shown to us through Jesus that it is proper to translate YHWH as "Lord." The use of all capitals is a convention used by translators to indicate that YHWH is behind the word "Lord" and not the normal Hebrew word adhon.
When a translator encounters a word, he is faced with two choices: he can translate the word or he can transliterate the word. Translation is finding a word that is close to the meaning of the word of the original language while still keeping the readability of the original language in the target language. Transliteration is to give the closest spelling of a word in the target language so that when pronounced in the target language it sounds close to the sound of the word in the original language. Thus we see from ancient times both translation in some cases and transliteration in some other cases of the Bible works of the scribes and teachers of it.
Could We Ever Pronounce 'YHWH' Atleast Closer To The Real One?
Regarding the pronounciation of 'YHWH', we have clues to the pronunciation because YHWH was incorporated into other words. For example, "hallelujah" comes from "hallelu Yah" or "praise Yah," where yahh was an abbreviation for YHWH (the first two letters). You can see it at the end of many Hebrew names: Isaiah (YHWH has saved) or Hezekiah (YHWH has strengthened). It can appear at the beginning of names, such as Jehoshaphat (YHWH has judged) or Joash (YHWH has come to help). Our real knowledge of the pronunciation of YHWH can come from several very early translations of Hebrew. Shortly after the time of Nehemiah, a group of Jews lived on the island of Elephantine conclude that they pronounced YHWH as "yahu." Clement of Alexander, writing about 200 AD, transliterated YHWH into Greek as 'iaoue', which would be pronounced "yahweh" in English today. In other words, we breathe in 'ya' and breathe out 'hu', which represents the very breath of life which is in God, the very beginning and the very end. Do we realize that by the very sound of our breathing heard to us, we pronounce and ask God for help to continue to live life through HIS LIFE that sustain us? When we gasp or pant heavily due to having difficulty breathing, as after strenuous activity or holding one's breath, we ask God "yahu" to sustain us to live for His GLORY!
We may or may not use these representative names of God, above all it is not wrong to use these names with reverence in one's heart for God Almighty, and when it is done in that proper way, God does understand and recognizes it (Psa 147:11; Luke 1:50). When it is used against the devils, the same name will carry authority if it is done with the anointing of God which is God's heavenly power upon the one who speaks the name of God (Luke 4:18-19; 10:19; Acts 1:8). When the same representative name of God is used among people, the familiarity to use it comes along with the usage in the Scipture and the translation which most people use, which may also be through the spoken message of the person whom God uses to do his work (Acts 19:13, 17; Mark 9:38-41; Matt 12:27-28; Jonah 3:7-9; Dan 3:28; 6:26).
Today without an iota of doubt in our New Testament times, Jesus is the name above all names for us all (Phil. 2:9-11). Praise the Lord!
Much Blessings....
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