Posted: 1/6/2010 2:12:51 PM EDT
| Why do I see God spelled this way? I was looking at a Messianic Jewish site (spurred by another thread I found here) and I saw it spelled that way, which I thought was odd because in my ignorance I always just assumed it was people who didn't want to say the name of God. What's the deal? |
| Out of respect. His name is so holy we dare not utter it or write it. It is a jewish custom. I believe they even changed the pen they were using to write in His name (or at least the part they would write) Some us us always capitalize the First letter of His name... Him, Word, Lord, etc. for the same reason. |
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This is from the Wikapedia...
"Yahweh" and the tetragrammaton "Yahweh" is a the name of God in the Hebrew bible, where it is written as four consonants (YHWH), called the tetragrammaton. Jews ceased to use the name in the Greco-Roman period, replacing it with the common noun Elohim, “god,” to demonstrate the universal sovereignty of Israel’s God over all others; at the same time, the divine name was increasingly regarded as too sacred to be uttered, and was replaced in spoken ritual by the word Adonai (“My Lord”). From about the 6th to the 10th century the Masoretes, Jewish scholars who were the first to add vowels to the text of the Hebrew Bible, used the vowel signs of the Hebrew words Adonai or Elohim as the vowels for YHWH, producing the artificial name Jehovah (YeHoWaH). Christian scholars after the Renaissance and Reformation periods used the term Jehovah for YHWH, but in the 19th and 20th centuries biblical scholars again began to use the form Yahweh and it is now the conventional usage in biblical scholarship.[1] Linguistic roots and meaning The name is generally linked to a form of the Semitic word-stem HWY, conveying the idea of "being". (Semitic word-stems are groups of consonants around which vowels are arranged to form nouns and verbs). The verb "to be" plus the name of El, the chief god in the pantheon, could give rise to the forms yahweh-el ("He is El", "He shows himself as El") or the reverse, El-yawheh (El who shows himself) - the latter, but not the former, is found occasionally in the bible.[4] In Exodus [3:19] God himself, asked by Moses for his name, replies: "I am that I am...Say (to the Israelites), 'I Am has sent me to you'."[Exod. 3:13-16] A similar statement recurs throughout Leviticus, where God states with each law, "I am Yahweh." But despite looking back to the same verbal root HWY, these passages are essentially theological: they are intended not to explain the origin or meaning of the name, but to convey the image of a powerful God who will stay with and strengthen Israel Of all His names, I love "I Am" the best. Especially because of His conversation with Moses alluded to above. I find it kind of impatient and 'in your face'! "Tell them I Am sent you! How bold a statement! But, I digress... |
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Quoted:
Hmmm......ok. I understand the concept, I guess, but not the application. Do His other names not equal the holiness of the name of God? El-Rapha, Jesus, Yahweh, etc?
As far as I understand from a Jewish standpoint, no they do not, and most Jews do not even consider "Jesus" to be the name of God. <––––Not a Jew |
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Quoted:
Hmmm......ok. I understand the concept, I guess, but not the application. Do His other names not equal the holiness of the name of God? El-Rapha, Jesus, Yahweh, etc?
It is done out of respect and to avoid breaking the third commandment "You shall not take the name of the L-RD your G-d in vain". Usually, one will use Blessed be the Name or Baruch HaShem or Blessed be He as opposed to using L-rd or G-d, or other names for G-d,etc. |