Pronouncing God's name - why not?

[PeterK]

Showing respect for God, of course, is highly desirable. And this respect manifests itself in many different ways. But in the case of forbidding the pronouncment of YHWH, I’m curious. We would only know God’s name if he revealed it to us. We did not give God his name, he revealed it to us. If God didn’t want us to pronounce his name then why did he reveal it? Just curious.

Thanks

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Peter

 

[Timidity]

At the risk of sounding like an atheistic anthropologist (I’m neither) it’s actually a common ancient Middle East cultural thing, and wasn’t limited to the Jews. For instance, although “Ba’al” is mentioned in the Bible a lot, there was no religion in the region that worshiped a god named “Ba’al”–that word simply means “lord” and is used as a title.

 

[Joel_Tunnah]

YHWH is the name of god with the vowels removed. Only the high priests, in the Temple in Jerusalem knew the actual pronunciation, and used it.
For Christians, Jesus told us what to call God: “Father”.

 

[quasimodo]

My understanding is that they thought that using someone’s name give person A (for example) at least a little power over person B. If God (person B here) is absolutely sovereign, you cannot have any control over Him therefore you cannot speak His name. God revealed it to His friends but even then they were limited in its use.

of course I could be wrong

 

[Keikiolu]

My understanding is that they thought that using someone’s name give person A (for example) at least a little power over person B. If God (person B here) is absolutely sovereign, you cannot have any control over Him therefore you cannot speak His name. God revealed it to His friends but even then they were limited in its use.

of course I could be wrong

The taboo to not “be familiar” with your superiors is nearly a universal human behavior. So it’s kind-of a “natural law” reaction for people.

Also, since the name for God is simply “AM” {first person singular “to be”} (in english) it is extremely “weird”, and jarring, to have it used as a name of the All Mighty, so to avoid the “weirdness” created in those who heard it it was a “reserved name”, to be used only by those (and within earshot of those) who understood how such a non-name could be the appropriate name of God.

The implications of the self-referential form of the verb “to be” being revealed by God as His actual NAME are something one could cogitate on for 3 lifetimes and never run out of interesting points of beautiful inspiration.

 

[BanksOfTheTiber]

During the Babylonian captivity, the Hebrew language spoken by the Jews was replaced by the Aramaic language of their Babylonian captors, which was closely related to Hebrew and, while sharing many vocabulary words in common, contained some words that sounded the same or similar but had other meanings. In Aramaic, the Hebrew word for “blaspheme” used in Leviticus 24:16, “Anyone who blasphemes the name of YHWH must be put to death” carried the meaning of “pronounce” rather than “blaspheme”. When the Jews began speaking Aramaic, this verse was understood to mean, “Anyone who pronounces the name of YHWH must be put to death.” Since then, Jews have maintained the custom of not pronouncing the name, but use Adonai (“my Lord [plural of majesty]”) instead

Taken from: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yahweh

 

[DaveBj]

During the Babylonian captivity, the Hebrew language spoken by the Jews was replaced by the Aramaic language of their Babylonian captors, which was closely related to Hebrew and, while sharing many vocabulary words in common, contained some words that sounded the same or similar but had other meanings. In Aramaic, the Hebrew word for “blaspheme” used in Leviticus 24:16, “Anyone who blasphemes the name of YHWH must be put to death” carried the meaning of “pronounce” rather than “blaspheme”. When the Jews began speaking Aramaic, this verse was understood to mean, “Anyone who pronounces the name of YHWH must be put to death.” Since then, Jews have maintained the custom of not pronouncing the name, but use Adonai (“my Lord [plural of majesty]”) instead

As a matter of fact, I was researching this subject this very morning. The sources I was using could not identify exactly when the Jews quit pronouncing the Name, only that it was some centuries after the institution of the Jewish religion, and some time before the translation of the Greek Old Testament (the LXX). The above quote is actually a better explanation that I could find this morning.

As an interesting side note, “Adonai” is actually translated “my lords” (plural). “Adon” (“lord”) is the singular; “adonim” (“lords”) is plural; “adoney” is the plural construct state, and the combination of “adoney” with the suffixed 1st-person singular pronominal suffix ("-iy," “my”) becomes “adonai.”

Being a language geek is such fun