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The Sacred Name Movement (SNM) refers to the movement within
Adventism Adventism is a branch of Protestant Christianity that believes in the imminent Second Coming (or the "Second Advent") of Jesus Christ. It originated in the 1830s in the United States during the Second Great Awakening when Baptist preacher Wil ...
which, prompted by Joseph Franklin Rutherford, were concerned with the Hebrew name of God, a concern that led the Zion's Watch Tower Tract Society to the adoption of the name
Jehovah's Witnesses Jehovah's Witnesses is a millenarian restorationist Christian denomination with nontrinitarian beliefs distinct from mainstream Christianity. The group reports a worldwide membership of approximately 8.7 million adherents involved ...
. Within the movement the concern with the name was, influenced by Clarence Orvil Dodd, as important as Jewish festivals. SNM believers also generally observe many of the
Old Testament The Old Testament (often abbreviated OT) is the first division of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible or Tanakh, a collection of ancient religious Hebrew writings by the Israelites. The ...
laws and ceremonies such as the Seventh-day Sabbath, Torah festivals, and '' kashrut'' food laws.


Beliefs

The Sacred Name Movement includes various small groups (such as Yahweh's Assembly in Messiah, and Yahweh's Assembly in Yahshua) generally unified by the use of the name
Yahweh Yahweh *''Yahwe'', was the national god of ancient Israel and Judah. The origins of his worship reach at least to the early Iron Age, and likely to the Late Bronze Age The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately fr ...
and a Hebraic form for the name of God's son (such as Yahshua). SNM groups generally maintain the seventh day Sabbath (Friday sunset to Saturday sunset) along with the Jewish feast days such as
Passover Passover, also called Pesach (; ), is a major Jewish holiday that celebrates the Biblical story of the Israelites escape from slavery in Egypt, which occurs on the 15th day of the Hebrew month of Nisan, the first month of Aviv, or spring. ...
and the Feast of Weeks. They believe that the Torah law was not abolished. They believe that Yahshua is the son of Yahweh, and that his life, death, burial, and resurrection provide salvation. They believe that after persons repent of their sins, they should be baptized in the name of Yahshua. SNM groups reject
Easter Easter,Traditional names for the feast in English are "Easter Day", as in the '' Book of Common Prayer''; "Easter Sunday", used by James Ussher''The Whole Works of the Most Rev. James Ussher, Volume 4'') and Samuel Pepys''The Diary of Samuel ...
and
Christmas Christmas is an annual festival commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ, observed primarily on December 25 as a religious and cultural celebration among billions of people around the world. A feast central to the Christian liturgical year ...
as pagan in origin. The movement also rejects the doctrine of the Trinity as unbiblical. Groups within the movement have differed on doctrinal points, such as the wearing of beards and about what constitutes a Sabbath rest. Though it has similar beliefs, the Assemblies of Yahweh (headquartered in Bethel, Pennsylvania) distanced itself from the Sacred Name Movement, referring to it as "disorganisation" and "confusion".


History

The Sacred Name Movement arose in the early 20th century out of the
Church of God (Seventh Day) The Churches of God (Seventh-Day) is composed of a number of sabbath-keeping churches, among which the General Conference of the Church of God, or simply CoG7, is the best-known organization. The Churches of God (Seventh Day) observe Sabbath o ...
movement. This movement was influenced by Joseph Franklin Rutherford who changed the name of the main branch of the Bible Student movement to
Jehovah's Witnesses Jehovah's Witnesses is a millenarian restorationist Christian denomination with nontrinitarian beliefs distinct from mainstream Christianity. The group reports a worldwide membership of approximately 8.7 million adherents involved ...
in 1931, based on his belief in the importance of the Hebrew name of God. C. O. Dodd, a member of the Church of God (Seventh Day), began to keep the Jewish festivals (including
Passover Passover, also called Pesach (; ), is a major Jewish holiday that celebrates the Biblical story of the Israelites escape from slavery in Egypt, which occurs on the 15th day of the Hebrew month of Nisan, the first month of Aviv, or spring. ...
) in 1928, adopting sacred name doctrines in the late 1930s. To promote his views, Dodd began to publish ''The Faith'' magazine in 1937. American religious scholar J. Gordon Melton wrote, "No single force in spreading the Sacred Name movement was as important as ''The Faith'' magazine."Melton 476.


Sacred Name Bibles

Angelo Traina, a disciple of Dodd, undertook the production of a Sacred Name edition of the
Bible The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts o ...
, publishing the ''Holy Name New Testament'' in 1950 and the ''Holy Name Bible'' in 1962, both based on the
King James Version The King James Version (KJV), also the King James Bible (KJB) and the Authorized Version, is an English translation of the Christian Bible for the Church of England, which was commissioned in 1604 and published in 1611, by sponsorship of K ...
, but with some names and words changed to Hebraic forms, such as "
God In monotheistic thought, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator, and principal object of faith. Swinburne, R.G. "God" in Honderich, Ted. (ed)''The Oxford Companion to Philosophy'', Oxford University Press, 1995. God is typically ...
" to " Elohim", "LORD" to "Yahweh" and "
Jesus Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religiou ...
" to "Yahshua". Other Sacred Name Bibles have since been produced, and most Sacred Name Movement denominations use a Sacred Name Bible.


See also

* Christian views on the Old Covenant * Ebionites *
Holy Name of Jesus In Catholicism, the veneration of the Holy Name of Jesus (also ''Most Holy Name of Jesus'', it, Santissimo Nome di Gesù) developed as a separate type of devotion in the early modern period, in parallel to that of the ''Sacred Heart''. The ...
* Judaizers


References


Sources

* * {{Christianity and Judaism Adventism Christian belief and doctrine