The Name of God and the Septuagint, DSS

[patrick457]

Did those making the allegations provide primary source evidence substantiating such a claim? If not, why should we even give such an outrageous, unauthenticated contention a second thought?

Ignatius is correct. The person who’s claiming this is the one who’s gotta hand over the proof.

I’ll say the guy is wrong that Yhwh was something “added to Biblical texts by the Masoretes.” But it’s a fact that we don’t know what the original pronunciation of Yhwh is. ‘Jehovah’ is a essentially medieval misunderstanding of the Name (it’s just Yhwh with the vowels for 'Adonai ‘Lord’), and ‘Yahweh’ is ultimately just an educated guess. Who knows? It could have been ‘Yahweh’ or ‘Yahwo’ or ‘Yahu’ or ‘Yaho’ - one guess is as good as another.

Excellent! Thanks very much for the help. I greatly appreciate it. I just need some specific examples from the DSS themselves of the usage of the Name YHWH as well as general authentications of the DSS as authentic, credible, and reliable Biblical sources for those who would question their authenticity. Do you happen to have any sources / references for that so I can demonstrate that they are, indeed, reliable?

Well, here’s the thing. When we say ‘Dead Sea Scrolls’, we’re talking about at least 972 texts found in eleven caves (that’s not counting other manuscripts found in other areas in the Judaean desert). Of course I can’t give you all of them, and I might take some time to dig up concrete examples, but for now, I’d give you a link to the ‘official’ DSS websites:

deadseascrolls.org.il/
dss.collections.imj.org.il/

You might wanna start with the Great Isaiah Scroll (2nd century BC or earlier).

 

[patrick457]

I have one for now - I’ll give other examples when I have more time.

Here’s the Psalms Scroll from Qumran, dating from the 1st century AD (AD 30-50) - so just around the time of Jesus. You would notice that while the text is mostly written in the so-called Herodian script (which is pretty much the same as the modern Hebrew alphabet), Yhwh is written in the old paleo-Hebrew alphabet. It should be pretty easy to spot even from this distance.

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If you want to look at it more closely, here’s a link.

 

[patrick457]

Here’s Isaiah 11:1-11 from the Great Isaiah Scroll (2nd century BC or earlier). Yhwh is underlined.



(v. 1-2) There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse,
and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit.
And the Spirit of Yhwh shall rest upon him,
the Spirit of wisdom and understanding,
the Spirit of counsel and might,
the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of Yhwh.
And his delight shall be in the fear of Yhwh. …]
(v. 9) They shall not hurt or destroy
in all my holy mountain;
for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of Yhwh
as the waters cover the sea.

Here’s a copy of Deuteronomy 5 - The Ten Commandments (late 1st century BC).



And Moses summoned all Israel and said to them, "Hear, O Israel, the statutes and the rules that I speak in your hearing today, and you shall learn them and be careful to do them. Yhwh our God made a covenant with us in Horeb. Not with our fathers did Yhwh make this covenant, but with us, who are all of us here alive today. Yhwh spoke with you face to face at the mountain, out of the midst of the fire, awhile I stood between the Lord and you at that time, to declare to you the word of Yhwh. For you were afraid because of the fire, and you did not go up into the mountain. He said:

"'I am Yhwh your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
"'You shall have no other gods before me.
"'You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them; for I Yhwh your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.
"'You shall not take the name of Yhwh your God in vain, for Yhwh will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.
“'Observe the Sabbath day, to keep it holy, as Yhwh your God commanded you. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to Yhwh your God. …]”

 

[patrick457]

And here is a gem: this is a fragment of a copy of the book of Samuel (4QSam[sup]b[/sup]) written about 250-225 BC, making it one of the two or three oldest manuscripts found in Qumran, which all date from the 3rd century BC; in fact, these manuscripts are even older than the settlement itself (which means that they were brought from somewhere else). This one preserves bits of text from 1 Samuel 23:9-12.



David knew that Saul was plotting harm against him. And he said to Abiathar the priest, “Bring the ephod here.” Then David said, “Yhwh, the God of Israel, your servant has surely heard that Saul seeks to come to Keilah, to destroy the city on my account. Will the men of Keilah surrender me into his hand? Will Saul come down, as your servant has heard? Yhwh, the God of Israel, please tell your servant.” And Yhwh said, “He will come down.” Then David said, “Will the men of Keilah surrender me and my men into the hand of Saul?” And Yhwh said, “They will surrender you.”

Here meanwhile is or commentary on Habakkukpesher (also late 1st century BC). Note that like the Psalms scroll, Yhwh (Habbakuk 2:12-14) is written in paleo-Hebrew script.



(v. 12-13) Woe to him who builds a city with blood
and founds a town upon falsehood!
Behold, is it not from Yhwh of hosts
that peoples shall labour for fire
and the nations shall strive for naught?

…]

(v. 14) For as the waters cover the sea,
so shall the earth be filled
with the knowledge of the glory of Yhwh.

Meanwhile, here’s a Greek fragment of Leviticus (1st century BC). What makes this interesting is that in this copy, the Name is written in Greek: ιαω Iaō.

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I can give you more if you want.

 

[patrick457]

Here’s a nice picture.

ccat.sas.upenn.edu/rak//lxxjewpap/tetragram.jpg