transliterated Transliteration is a type of conversion of a text from one writing system, script to another that involves swapping Letter (alphabet), letters (thus ''wikt:trans-#Prefix, trans-'' + ''wikt:littera#Latin, liter-'') in predictable ways, such as ...

God In monotheistic belief systems, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator, and principal object of faith. In polytheistic belief systems, a god is "a spirit or being believed to have created, or for controlling some part of the un ...

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
. '' yod'', '' he'', '' vav'', and ''he''.The word "tetragrammaton" originates from Greek 'four' + ( ) 'letter' The name may be derived from a verb that means 'to be', 'to exist', 'to cause to become', or 'to come to pass'. While there is no consensus about the structure and etymology of the name, the form ''

Yahweh Yahweh was an Ancient Semitic religion, ancient Semitic deity of Weather god, weather and List of war deities, war in the History of the ancient Levant, ancient Levant, the national god of the kingdoms of Kingdom of Judah, Judah and Kingdom ...

'' (with

niqqud In Hebrew orthography, niqqud or nikud ( or ) is a system of diacritical signs used to represent vowels or distinguish between alternative pronunciations of letters of the Hebrew alphabet. Several such diacritical systems were developed in the Ea ...

: ) is now almost universally accepted among Biblical and Semitic linguistics scholars,The form ''Yahweh'' is also dominant in Christianity, but is not used in Islam or Judaism. though the vocalization ''

Jehovah Jehovah () is a Romanization, Latinization of the Hebrew language, Hebrew , one Tiberian vocalization, vocalization of the Tetragrammaton (YHWH), the proper name of the God in Judaism, God of Israel in the Hebrew BibleOld Testament. The Tetr ...

'' continues to have wide usage, especially in Christian traditions. In modernity, Christianity is the only Abrahamic religion in which the Tetragrammaton is freely and openly pronounced. The books of the

Torah The Torah ( , "Instruction", "Teaching" or "Law") is the compilation of the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, namely the books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. The Torah is also known as the Pentateuch () ...

and the rest of the

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
. '' Esther,

Ecclesiastes Ecclesiastes ( ) is one of the Ketuvim ('Writings') of the Hebrew Bible and part of the Wisdom literature of the Christian Old Testament. The title commonly used in English is a Latin transliteration of the Greek translation of the Hebrew word ...

, and (with a possible instance of ('' Jah'') in verse 8:6) the

Song of Songs The Song of Songs (), also called the Canticle of Canticles or the Song of Solomon, is a Biblical poetry, biblical poem, one of the five ("scrolls") in the ('writings'), the last section of the Tanakh. Unlike other books in the Hebrew Bible, i ...

contain this

Hebrew Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and ...

name. Observant

Jews Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

and those who follow

Talmud The Talmud (; ) is the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary source of Jewish religious law (''halakha'') and Jewish theology. Until the advent of Haskalah#Effects, modernity, in nearly all Jewish communities, the Talmud was the cen ...

ic Jewish traditions do not pronounce nor do they read aloud proposed transcription forms such as ''Yahweh'' or '' Yehovah''; instead they replace it with a different term, whether in addressing or referring to the God of Israel. Common substitutions in Hebrew are ( , , pluralis majestatis taken as singular) or (''

Elohim ''Elohim'' ( ) is a Hebrew word meaning "gods" or "godhood". Although the word is plural in form, in the Hebrew Bible it most often takes singular verbal or pronominal agreement and refers to a single deity, particularly but not always the Go ...

'', literally 'gods' but treated as singular when meaning "God") in prayer, or ('' HaShem'', 'The Name') in everyday speech.

Four letters

The letters, properly written and read from right to left (in

Biblical Hebrew Biblical Hebrew ( or ), also called Classical Hebrew, is an archaic form of the Hebrew language, a language in the Canaanite languages, Canaanitic branch of the Semitic languages spoken by the Israelites in the area known as the Land of Isra ...

), are:

Etymology

The Hebrew Bible explains it by the formula ( ), the name of God revealed to Moses in Exodus 3:14. This would frame Y-H-W-H as a derivation from the Hebrew triconsonantal root (''h-y-h''), "to be, become, come to pass", with a third person masculine ()

prefix A prefix is an affix which is placed before the stem of a word. Particularly in the study of languages, a prefix is also called a preformative, because it alters the form of the word to which it is affixed. Prefixes, like other affixes, can b ...

, equivalent to English "he",It thus probably means "he causes to be, to become, etc." It has (''h-w-h'') as a variant form. ''The New Brown–Driver–Briggs-Gesenius Hebrew and English Lexicon With an Appendix Containing the Biblical Aramaic'' by Frances Brown, with the cooperation of S. R. Driver and Charles Briggs (1907), p. 217ff (entry listed under root ). in place of the first person ('-), thereby affording translations as "he who causes to exist", "he who is", etc.; although this would elicit the form Y-H-Y-H (), ''not'' Y-H-W-H. To rectify this, some scholars propose that the Tetragrammaton derived instead from the triconsonantal root (''h-w-h'')—itself an archaic doublet of —with the final form eliciting similar translations as those derived from the same. As such, the consensus among modern scholars considers that YHWH represents a verbal form. In this, the ''y-'' prefix represents the third masculine verbal prefix of the verb ''hyh'' or ''hwh'', "to be", as indicated in the Hebrew Bible.

Vocalisation

YHWH and Hebrew script

Like all letters in the Hebrew script, the letters in YHWH originally indicated consonants. In unpointed Biblical Hebrew, most vowels are not written, but some are indicated ambiguously, as certain letters came to have a secondary function indicating vowels (similar to the

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

use of I and V to indicate either the consonants /j, w/ or the vowels /i, u/). Hebrew letters used to indicate vowels are known as ' ''(imot kri'a)'' or '' matres lectionis'' ("mothers of reading"). Therefore, it can be difficult to deduce how a word is pronounced from its spelling, and each of the four letters in the Tetragrammaton can individually serve as a ''mater lectionis''. Several centuries later, between the 5th through 10th centuries CE, the original consonantal text of the Hebrew Bible was provided with vowel marks by the Masoretes to assist reading. In places where the word to be read (the ''qere'') differed from that indicated by the consonants of the written text (the ''ketiv''), they wrote the ''qere'' in the margin as a note showing what was to be read. In such a case the vowel marks of the ''qere'' were written on the ''ketiv''. For a few frequent words, the marginal note was omitted: these are called qere perpetuum. One of the frequent cases was the Tetragrammaton, which according to later Rabbinite Jewish practices should not be pronounced but read as ( , , Pluralis majestatis taken as singular), or, if the previous or next word already was

Adonai Judaism has different names given to God in Judaism, God, which are considered sacred: (), (''Adonai'' ), (''El (deity), El'' ), ( ), (''El Shaddai, Shaddai'' ), and ( ); some also include I Am that I Am.This is the formulation of Josep ...

, as "

Elohim ''Elohim'' ( ) is a Hebrew word meaning "gods" or "godhood". Although the word is plural in form, in the Hebrew Bible it most often takes singular verbal or pronominal agreement and refers to a single deity, particularly but not always the Go ...

" (/"God"). Writing the vowel diacritics of these two words on the consonants YHVH produces and respectively, ghost-words that would spell "Yehovah" and "Yehovih" respectively. The oldest complete or nearly complete manuscripts of the

Masoretic Text The Masoretic Text (MT or 𝕸; ) is the authoritative Hebrew and Aramaic text of the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible (''Tanakh'') in Rabbinic Judaism. The Masoretic Text defines the Jewish canon and its precise letter-text, with its vocaliz ...

with Tiberian vocalisation, such as the ''

Aleppo Codex The Aleppo Codex () is a medieval bound manuscript of the Hebrew Bible. The codex was written in the city of Tiberias in the tenth century CE (circa 920) under the rule of the Abbasid Caliphate, and was endorsed for its accuracy by Maimonides. ...

'' and the ''

Leningrad Codex The Leningrad Codex ( [Leningrad Book]; ) is the oldest known complete manuscript of the Hebrew Bible in Hebrew, using the Masoretic Text and Tiberian vocalization. According to its colophon (publishing), colophon, it was made in Cairo in AD ...

'', both of the 10th or 11th century, mostly write (''yəhwā''), with no pointing on the first ''h''. It could be because the ''o'' diacritic point plays no useful role in distinguishing between ''Adonai'' and ''

Elohim ''Elohim'' ( ) is a Hebrew word meaning "gods" or "godhood". Although the word is plural in form, in the Hebrew Bible it most often takes singular verbal or pronominal agreement and refers to a single deity, particularly but not always the Go ...

'' and so is redundant, or it could point to the ''qere'' being (''šmâ''), which is Aramaic language, Aramaic for "the Name".

Yahweh

The scholarly consensus is that the original pronunciation of the Tetragrammaton was ''Yahweh'' (). R. R. Reno agrees that, when in the late first millennium Jewish scholars inserted indications of vowels into the Hebrew Bible, they signalled that what was pronounced was "Adonai" (Lord); non-Jews later combined the vowels of Adonai with the consonants of the Tetragrammaton and invented the name "Jehovah". Paul Joüon and Takamitsu Muraoka state: "The Qre is ''the Lord'', whilst the

Ktiv KTIV (channel 4) is a television station in Sioux City, Iowa, United States, affiliated with NBC and The CW Plus. Owned by Gray Media, the station has studios on Signal Hill Drive in Sioux City, and its transmitter is located near Hinton, Iowa ...

is probably (according to ancient witnesses)", and they add: "Note 1: In our translations, we have used ''Yahweh'', a form widely accepted by scholars, instead of the traditional ''Jehovah.''". In 1869, '' Smith's Bible Dictionary'', a collaborative work of noted scholars of the time, declared: "Whatever, therefore, be the true pronunciation of the word, there can be little doubt that it is not ''Jehovah''." Mark P. Arnold remarks that certain conclusions drawn from the pronunciation of as "Yahweh" would be valid even if the scholarly consensus were not correct. Thomas Römer holds that "the original pronunciation of Yhwh was 'Yahô' or 'Yahû. Max Reisel, in ''The Mysterious Name of YHWH'', says that the "vocalisation of the Tetragrammaton must originally have been YeHūàH or YaHūàH". The element ''yahwi-'' (''ia-wi'') is found in Amorite personal names (e.g. ''yahwi-dagan''), commonly denoted as the semantic equivalent of the Akkadian ''ibašši-''DN. The latter refers to one existing which, in the context of deities, can also refer to one's eternal existence, which aligns with Bible verses such as and views that '' ehye 'ăšer 'ehye'' can mean "I am the Existing One". It also explains the ease of Israelites applying the Olam (or 'everlasting') epithet from El to Yahweh. But J. Philip Hyatt believes it is more likely that ''yahwi-'' refers to a god creating and sustaining the life of a newborn child rather than the universe. This conception of God was more popular among ancient Near Easterners but eventually, the Israelites removed the association of ''yahwi-'' to any human ancestor and combined it with other elements (e.g. ''Yahweh ṣəḇāʾōṯ''). Hillel Ben-Sasson states there is insufficient evidence for Amorites using ''yahwi-'' to refer to a god. But he argues that it mirrors other theophoric names and that ''yahwi-'', or more accurately ''yawi'', derives from the root ''hwy'' in ''pa 'al'', which means "he will be".

Frank Moore Cross Frank Moore Cross Jr. (July 13, 1921 – October 16, 2012) was the Hancock Professor of Hebrew and Other Oriental Languages at Harvard University, notable for his work in the interpretation of the Dead Sea Scrolls, his 1973 '' magnum opus'' ''Ca ...

says: "It must be emphasized that the Amorite verbal form is of interest only in attempting to reconstruct the proto-Hebrew or South Canaanite verbal form used in the name Yahweh. We should argue vigorously against attempts to take Amorite yahwi and yahu as divine epithets." The adoption at the time of the

Protestant Reformation The Reformation, also known as the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation, was a time of major theological movement in Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the papacy and ...

of "Jehovah" in place of the traditional "Lord" in some new translations, vernacular or Latin, of the biblical Tetragrammaton stirred up dispute about its correctness. In 1711, Adriaan Reland published a book containing the text of 17th-century writings, five attacking and five defending it. As critical of the use of "Jehovah" it incorporated writings by Johannes van den Driesche (1550–1616), known as Drusius; Sixtinus Amama (1593–1629); Louis Cappel (1585–1658); Johannes Buxtorf (1564–1629); Jacob Alting (1618–1679). Defending "Jehovah" were writings by Nicholas Fuller (1557–1626) and Thomas Gataker (1574–1654) and three essays by Johann Leusden (1624–1699). The opponents of "Jehovah" said that the Tetragrammaton should be pronounced as "Adonai" and in general do not speculate on what may have been the original pronunciation, although mention is made of the fact that some held that ''Jahve'' was that pronunciation. Almost two centuries after the 17th-century works reprinted by Reland, 19th-century

Wilhelm Gesenius Heinrich Friedrich Wilhelm Gesenius (3 February 178623 October 1842) was a German orientalist, lexicographer, Christian Hebraist, Lutheran theologian, Biblical scholar and critic. Biography Gesenius was born at Nordhausen. In 1803 he bec ...

reported in his ''Thesaurus Philologicus'' on the main reasoning of those who argued either for /''Yah h'' or /''Yahweh'' as the original pronunciation of the Tetragrammaton, as opposed to /''Yehovah''. He explicitly cited the 17th-century writers mentioned by Reland as supporters of , as well as implicitly citing Johann David Michaelis (1717–1791) and Johann Friedrich von Meyer (1772–1849), the latter of whom Johann Heinrich Kurtz described as the last of those "who have maintained with great pertinacity that was the correct and original pointing". Edward Robinson's translation of a work by Gesenius, gives Gesenius' personal view as: "My own view coincides with that of those who regard this name as anciently pronounced

Yahweh Yahweh was an Ancient Semitic religion, ancient Semitic deity of Weather god, weather and List of war deities, war in the History of the ancient Levant, ancient Levant, the national god of the kingdoms of Kingdom of Judah, Judah and Kingdom ...

like the Samaritans."

Non-biblical texts

Texts with Tetragrammaton

Current overviews begin with the

Egypt Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northe ...

ian

epigraphy Epigraphy () is the study of inscriptions, or epigraphs, as writing; it is the science of identifying graphemes, clarifying their meanings, classifying their uses according to dates and cultural contexts, and drawing conclusions about the wr ...

. A

hieroglyph Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs ( ) were the formal writing system used in Ancient Egypt for writing the Egyptian language. Hieroglyphs combined ideographic, logographic, syllabic and alphabetic elements, with more than 1,000 distinct characters. ...

ic inscription of the

Pharaoh Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...

Amenhotep III (1402–1363 BCE) mentions a group of Shasu whom it calls "the Shasu of Yhwꜣ" (read as: ''ja-h-wi'' or ''ja-h-wa''). James D. G. Dunn and John W. Rogerson suggested that the Amenhotep III inscription may indicate that worship of Yahweh originated in an area to the southeast of Israel. A later inscription from the time of

Ramesses II Ramesses II (sometimes written Ramses or Rameses) (; , , ; ), commonly known as Ramesses the Great, was an Pharaoh, Egyptian pharaoh. He was the third ruler of the Nineteenth Dynasty of Egypt, Nineteenth Dynasty. Along with Thutmose III of th ...

(1279–1213 BCE) in West Amara associates the Shasu nomads with ''S-rr'', interpreted as Mount Seir, spoken of in some texts as where Yahweh comes from. Egyptologist Thomas Schneider argued for the existence of a theophoric name in a Book of the Dead papyrus dating to the late 18th or early 19th dynasty which he translated as ''adōnī-rō'ē-yāh'', meaning "My lord is the shepherd of Yah". YHWH on Mesha Stele

The Mesha Stele, dated to 840 BCE, mentions the Israelite god ''

Yahweh Yahweh was an Ancient Semitic religion, ancient Semitic deity of Weather god, weather and List of war deities, war in the History of the ancient Levant, ancient Levant, the national god of the kingdoms of Kingdom of Judah, Judah and Kingdom ...

''. Roughly contemporary pottery sherds and plaster inscriptions found at Kuntillet Ajrud mention "Yahweh of

Samaria Samaria (), the Hellenized form of the Hebrew name Shomron (), is used as a historical and Hebrew Bible, biblical name for the central region of the Land of Israel. It is bordered by Judea to the south and Galilee to the north. The region is ...

and his Asherah" and "Yahweh of Teman and his Asherah". A tomb inscription at Khirbet el-Qom also mentions Yahweh. Dated slightly later (7th century BCE) there are an ostracon from the collections of Shlomo Moussaieff, and two tiny silver amulet scrolls found at Ketef Hinnom that mention Yahweh. Also a wall inscription, dated to the late 6th century BCE, with mention of Yahweh had been found in a tomb at Khirbet Beit Lei. Yahweh is mentioned also in the

Lachish letters The Lachish Letters are a series of letters written in carbon ink containing ancient Israelite inscriptions in Ancient Hebrew on clay ostraca. The letters were discovered at the excavations at Lachish (Tell ed-Duweir). The ostraca were discov ...

(587 BCE) and the slightly earlier Tel Arad ostraca, and on a stone from

Mount Gerizim Mount Gerizim ( ; ; ; , or ) is one of two mountains in the immediate vicinity of the State of Palestine, Palestinian city of Nablus and the biblical city of Shechem. It forms the southern side of the valley in which Nablus is situated, the nor ...

(3rd or the beginning of the 2nd century BCE).

Texts with similar theonyms

The theonyms YHW and YHH are found in the Elephantine papyri of about 500 BCE. One ostracon with YH is thought to have lost the final letter of an original YHW. These texts are in Aramaic language, Aramaic, not the language of the Hebrew Tetragrammaton (YHWH) and, unlike the Tetragrammaton, are of three letters, not four. However, because they were written by Jews, they are assumed to refer to the same deity and to be either an abbreviated form of the Tetragrammaton or the original name from which the name YHWH developed. Kristin De Troyer says that YHW or YHH, and also YH, are attested in the fifth and fourth-century BCE papyri from Elephantine and Wadi Daliyeh: "In both collections one can read the name of God as Yaho (or Yahu) and Ya". The name YH (Yah/Jah), the first syllable of "Yahweh", appears 50 times in the Old Testament, 26 times alone (Exodus 15:2; 17:16; and 24 times in the Psalms), 24 times in the expression " Hallelujah". According to De Troyer, the short names, instead of being ineffable like "Yahweh", seem to have been in spoken use not only as elements of personal names but also in reference to God: "The Samaritans thus seem to have pronounced the Name of God as Jaho or Ja." She cites Theodoret () as that the shorter names of God were pronounced by the Samaritans as "Iabe" and by the Jews as "Ia". She adds that the Bible also indicates that the short form "Yah" was spoken, as in the phrase " Halleluyah". The '' Patrologia Graeca'' texts of Theodoret differ slightly from what De Troyer says. In ''Quaestiones in Exodum'' 15 he says that Samaritans pronounced the name Ἰαβέ and Jews the name Άϊά. (The Greek term Άϊά is a transcription of the Exodus 3:14 phrase אֶהְיֶה (''ehyeh''), "I am".) In ''Haereticarum Fabularum Compendium'' 5.3, he uses the spelling Ἰαβαί.

Magical papyri

Among the Jews in the

Second Temple Period The Second Temple period or post-exilic period in Jewish history denotes the approximately 600 years (516 BCE – 70 CE) during which the Second Temple stood in the city of Jerusalem. It began with the return to Zion and subsequent reconstructio ...

magical amulets became very popular. Representations of the Tetragrammaton name or combinations inspired by it in languages such as Greek and Coptic, giving some indication of its pronunciation, occur as names of powerful agents in Jewish magical papyri found in Egypt. ''Iave'' and ''Yaba'' occurs frequently, "apparently the Samaritan enunciation of the tetragrammaton YHWH (Yahweh)". The most commonly invoked god is Ιαω (''Iaō''), another vocalization of the tetragrammaton YHWH. There is a single instance of the heptagram (''iaōouēe''). ''Yāwē'' is found in an Ethiopian Christian list of magical names of Jesus, purporting to have been taught by him to his disciples.

Vernacular evidence

Also relevant is the use of the name in theophoric names; there is a common Hebrew prefix form, Yeho or "Yhō-", and a common suffix form, "Yahū" or "-Yhū". These provide some corroborating evidence of how YHWH was pronounced.

Hebrew Bible

Masoretic Text

According to the Jewish Encyclopedia it occurs 5,410 times in the Hebrew scriptures. In the

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
. '' Kittel's ''Biblia Hebraica'' and the '' Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia''. In addition, the marginal notes or ''masorah''''masora parva'' (small) or ''masora marginalis'': notes to the Masoretic Text, written in the margins of the left, right and between the columns and the comments on the top and bottom margins to ''masora magna'' (large). indicate that in another 134 places, where the received text has the word ''Adonai'', an earlier text had the Tetragrammaton.C. D. Ginsburg in ''The Massorah. Compiled from manuscripts'', London 1880
vol I, p. 25, 26, § 115
lists the 134 places where this practice is observed, and likewise in 8 places where the received text has ''Elohim'' (C. D. Ginsburg, ''Introduction to the Massoretico – Critical Edition of the Hebrew Bible'', London 1897
s. 368, 369
. These places are listed in: C.D. Ginsburg, ''The Massorah. Compiled from manuscripts'', vol I, p. 26
§ 116
which would add up to 142 additional occurrences. Even in the

Dead Sea Scrolls The Dead Sea Scrolls, also called the Qumran Caves Scrolls, are a set of List of Hebrew Bible manuscripts, ancient Jewish manuscripts from the Second Temple period (516 BCE – 70 CE). They were discovered over a period of ten years, between ...

practice varied with regard to use of the Tetragrammaton. According to '' Brown–Driver–Briggs'', ( ''qere'' ) occurs 6,518 times, and (qere ) 305 times in the Masoretic Text. The first appearance of the Tetragrammaton is in the

Book of Genesis The Book of Genesis (from Greek language, Greek ; ; ) is the first book of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament. Its Hebrew name is the same as its incipit, first word, (In the beginning (phrase), 'In the beginning'). Genesis purpor ...

2:4. The only books it does not appear in are

Ecclesiastes Ecclesiastes ( ) is one of the Ketuvim ('Writings') of the Hebrew Bible and part of the Wisdom literature of the Christian Old Testament. The title commonly used in English is a Latin transliteration of the Greek translation of the Hebrew word ...

, the

Book of Esther The Book of Esther (; ; ), also known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as "the Scroll" ("the wikt:מגילה, Megillah"), is a book in the third section (, "Writings") of the Hebrew Bible. It is one of the Five Megillot, Five Scrolls () in the Hebr ...

, and

Song of Songs The Song of Songs (), also called the Canticle of Canticles or the Song of Solomon, is a Biblical poetry, biblical poem, one of the five ("scrolls") in the ('writings'), the last section of the Tanakh. Unlike other books in the Hebrew Bible, i ...

. In the Book of Esther the Tetragrammaton does not appear, but it has been distinguished

acrostic An acrostic is a poem or other word composition in which the ''first'' letter (or syllable, or word) of each new line (or paragraph, or other recurring feature in the text) spells out a word, message or the alphabet. The term comes from the Fre ...

-wise in the initial or last letters of four consecutive words,These are Est 1:20; 5:4, 13 and 7:7. The same acrostic has been seen in Exodus 3:14 and in the first four words of Psalm 96:11 (). as indicated in Est 7:5 by writing the four letters in red in at least three ancient Hebrew manuscripts. The short form / Yah (a digrammaton) occurs 50 times if the phrase hallellu-Yah is included": 43 times in the Psalms, once in Exodus 15:2; 17:16; Isaiah 12:2; 26:4, and twice in Isaiah 38:11. It also appears in the Greek phrase (Alleluia, Hallelujah) in . Other short forms are found as a component of theophoric Hebrew names in the Bible: jô- or jehô- (29 names) and -jāhû or -jāh (127 jnames). A form of jāhû/jehô appears in the name Elioenai (Elj(eh)oenai) in 1Ch 3:23–24; 4:36; 7:8; Ezr 22:22, 27; Neh 12:41. The following graph shows the absolute number of occurrences of the Tetragrammaton (6828 in all) in the books in the Masoretic Text, without relation to the length of the books. ImageSize = width:1000 height:330 PlotArea = left:50 right:20 top:25 bottom:30 TimeAxis = orientation:vertical AlignBars = late Colors = id:linegrey2 value:gray(0.9) id:linegrey value:gray(0.7) id:cobar value:rgb(0.2,0.7,0.8) id:cobar2 value:rgb(0.6,0.9,0.6) DateFormat = yyyy Period = from:0 till:800 ScaleMajor = unit:year increment:5000 start:0 gridcolor:linegrey ScaleMinor = unit:year increment:1000 start:0 gridcolor:linegrey2 PlotData = color:cobar width:17 align:left bar:Ge from:0 till: 165 bar:Ex from:0 till: 398 bar:Le from:0 till:311 bar:Nu from:0 till:396 bar:De from:0 till:550 bar:Jos from:0 till:224 bar:Jg from:0 till: 175 bar:Ru from:0 till: 18 bar:1Sa from:0 till: 320 bar:2Sa from:0 till: 153 bar:1Ki from:0 till: 257 bar:2Ki from:0 till:277 bar:1Ch from:0 till:175 bar:2Ch from:0 till:384 bar:Ezr from:0 till:37 bar:Ne from:0 till:7 bar:Es from:0 till:0 bar:Job from:0 till:32 bar:Ps from:0 till:695 bar:Pr from:0 till:87 bar:Ec from:0 till:0 bar:Ca from:0 till:0 bar:Isa from:0 till:450 bar:Jer from:0 till:726 bar:La from:0 till:32 bar:Eze from:0 till:434 bar:Da from:0 till:8 bar:Ho from:0 till:46 bar:Joe from:0 till:33 bar:Am from:0 till:82 bar:Ob from:0 till:7 bar:Jon from:0 till:26 bar:Mic from:0 till:40 bar:Na from:0 till:13 bar:Hab from:0 till:13 bar:Zep from:0 till:34 bar:Hag from:0 till:35 bar:Zec from:0 till:133 bar:Mal from:0 till:46 PlotData= textcolor:black fontsize:S bar:Ge at: 165 text: 165 shift:(-9,5) bar:Ex at: 398 text: 398 shift:(-8,5) bar:Le at: 311 text: 311 shift:(-8,5) bar:Nu at: 396 text: 396 shift:(-8,5) bar:De at: 550 text: 550 shift:(-8,5) bar:Jos at: 224 text: 224 shift:(-8,5) bar:Jg at: 175 text: 175 shift:(-9,5) bar:Ru at: 18 text: 18 shift:(-6,5) bar:1Sa at: 320 text: 320 shift:(-8,5) bar:2Sa at: 153 text: 153 shift:(-9,5) bar:1Ki at: 257 text: 257 shift:(-8,5) bar:2Ki at: 277 text: 277 shift:(-8,5) bar:1Ch at: 175 text: 175 shift:(-9,5) bar:2Ch at: 384 text: 384 shift:(-8,5) bar:Ezr at: 37 text: 37 shift:(-5,5) bar:Ne at: 17 text: 17 shift:(-6,5) bar:Es at: 0 text: 0 shift:(-2,5) bar:Job at: 32 text: 32 shift:(-5,5) bar:Ps at: 695 text: 695 shift:(-8,5) bar:Pr at: 87 text: 87 shift:(-5,5) bar:Ec at: 0 text: 0 shift:(-2,5) bar:Ca at: 0 text: 0 shift:(-2,5) bar:Isa at: 450 text: 450 shift:(-8,5) bar:Jer at: 726 text: 726 shift:(-8,5) bar:La at: 32 text: 32 shift:(-5,5) bar:Eze at: 434 text: 434 shift:(-8,5) bar:Da at: 8 text: 8 shift:(-2,5) bar:Ho at: 46 text: 46 shift:(-5,5) bar:Joe at: 33 text: 33 shift:(-5,5) bar:Am at: 81 text: 81 shift:(-5,5) bar:Ob at: 7 text: 7 shift:(-2,5) bar:Jon at: 26 text: 26 shift:(-5,5) bar:Mic at: 40 text: 40 shift:(-5,5) bar:Na at: 13 text: 13 shift:(-6,5) bar:Hab at: 13 text: 13 shift:(-6,5) bar:Zep at: 34 text: 34 shift:(-5,5) bar:Hag at: 35 text: 35 shift:(-5,5) bar:Zec at: 133 text: 133 shift:(-9,5) bar:Mal at: 46 text: 46 shift:(-5,5) TextData= fontsize:S pos:(190,300) text: The occurrence of the Tetragrammaton in the Hebrew Bible

Leningrad Codex

Six presentations of the Tetragrammaton with some or all of the vowel points of (Adonai) or (Elohim) are found in the

Leningrad Codex The Leningrad Codex ( [Leningrad Book]; ) is the oldest known complete manuscript of the Hebrew Bible in Hebrew, using the Masoretic Text and Tiberian vocalization. According to its colophon (publishing), colophon, it was made in Cairo in AD ...

of 1008–1010, as shown below. The close transcriptions do not indicate that the Masoretes intended the name to be pronounced in that way (see '' qere perpetuum''). ĕ is ''hataf segol''; ǝ is the pronounced form of plain

shva Shva or, in Biblical Hebrew, shĕwa () is a Hebrew alphabet, Hebrew niqqud vowel sign written as two vertical dots () beneath a letter. It indicates either the phoneme (shva na', mobile shva) or the complete absence of a vowel (/Zero (linguist ...

.

Dead Sea Scrolls

In the

Dead Sea Scrolls The Dead Sea Scrolls, also called the Qumran Caves Scrolls, are a set of List of Hebrew Bible manuscripts, ancient Jewish manuscripts from the Second Temple period (516 BCE – 70 CE). They were discovered over a period of ten years, between ...

and other Hebrew and Aramaic texts the Tetragrammaton and some other

names of God in Judaism Judaism has different names given to God in Judaism, God, which are considered sacred: (), (''Adonai'' ), (''El (deity), El'' ), ( ), (''El Shaddai, Shaddai'' ), and ( ); some also include I Am that I Am.This is the formulation of Josep ...

(such as El or Elohim) were sometimes written in

paleo-Hebrew script The Paleo-Hebrew script (), also Palaeo-Hebrew, Proto-Hebrew or Old Hebrew, is the writing system found in Canaanite and Aramaic inscriptions, including pre-Biblical and Biblical Hebrew, from southern Canaan, also known as the biblical kingdoms o ...

, showing that they were treated specially. Most of God's names were pronounced until about the 2nd century BCE. Then, as a tradition of non-pronunciation of the names developed, alternatives for the Tetragrammaton appeared, such as Adonai, Kurios and Theos. The 4Q120, a Greek fragment of Leviticus (26:2–16) discovered in the Dead Sea scrolls (Qumran) has ιαω ("Iao"), the Greek form of the Hebrew trigrammaton YHW. The historian John the Lydian (6th century) wrote: "The Roman

Varro Marcus Terentius Varro (116–27 BCE) was a Roman polymath and a prolific author. He is regarded as ancient Rome's greatest scholar, and was described by Petrarch as "the third great light of Rome" (after Virgil and Cicero). He is sometimes call ...

16–27 BCEdefining him hat is the Jewish Godsays that he is called Iao in the Chaldean mysteries" (De Mensibus IV 53). Van Cooten mentions that Iao is one of the "specifically Jewish designations for God" and "the Aramaic papyri from the Jews at Elephantine show that 'Iao' is an original Jewish term". The preserved manuscripts from Qumran show the inconsistent practice of writing the Tetragrammaton, mainly in biblical quotations: in some manuscripts is written in paleo-Hebrew script, square scripts or replaced with four dots or dashes (''tetrapuncta''). The members of the Qumran community were aware of the existence of the Tetragrammaton, but this was not tantamount to granting consent for its existing use and speaking. This is evidenced not only by special treatment of the Tetragrammaton in the text, but by the recommendation recorded in the 'Rule of Association' (VI, 27): "Who will remember the most glorious name, which is above all ... The table below presents all the manuscripts in which the Tetragrammaton is written in paleo-Hebrew script,In some manuscripts the Tetragrammaton was replaced by the word ''El'' or ''Elohim'' written in Paleo-Hebrew script, they are: 1QpMic (1Q14) 12 3; 1QMyst (1Q27) II 11; 1QHa I (Suk. = Puech IX) 26; II (X) 34; VII (XV) 5; XV (VII) 25; 1QH (1Q35) 1 5; 3QUnclassified fragments (3Q14) 18 2; 4QpPs (4Q173) 5 4; 4QAges of Creation A (4Q180) 1 1; 4QMidrEschate?(4Q183) 2 1; 3 1; fr. 1 kol. II 3; 4QS (4Q258) IX 8; 4QD (4Q267) fr. 9 kol. i 2; kol. iv 4; kol. v 4; 4QD (4Q268) 1 9; 4QComposition Concerning Divine Providence (4Q413) fr. 1–2 2, 4; 6QD (6Q15) 3 5; 6QpapHymn (6Q18) 6 5; 8 5; 10 3. W 4QShirShabbg (4Q406) 1 2; 3 2 występuje ''Elohim''. in square scripts, and all the manuscripts in which the copyists have used tetrapuncta. Copyists used the 'tetrapuncta' apparently to warn against pronouncing the name of God. In the manuscript number 4Q248 is in the form of bars.

Septuagint

Editions of the Septuagint Old Testament are based on the complete or almost complete fourth-century manuscripts Codex Vaticanus, Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Alexandrinus and consistently use Κ �ριο�, "

Lord Lord is an appellation for a person or deity who has authority, control, or power (social and political), power over others, acting as a master, chief, or ruler. The appellation can also denote certain persons who hold a title of the Peerage o ...

", where the

Masoretic Text The Masoretic Text (MT or 𝕸; ) is the authoritative Hebrew and Aramaic text of the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible (''Tanakh'') in Rabbinic Judaism. The Masoretic Text defines the Jewish canon and its precise letter-text, with its vocaliz ...

has the Tetragrammaton in Hebrew. This corresponds with the Jewish practice of replacing the Tetragrammaton with "

Adonai Judaism has different names given to God in Judaism, God, which are considered sacred: (), (''Adonai'' ), (''El (deity), El'' ), ( ), (''El Shaddai, Shaddai'' ), and ( ); some also include I Am that I Am.This is the formulation of Josep ...

" when reading the Hebrew word. However, five of the oldest manuscripts now extant (in fragmentary form) render the Tetragrammaton into Greek in a different way. Two of these are of the first century BCE: Papyrus Fouad 266 uses in the normal

Hebrew alphabet The Hebrew alphabet (, ), known variously by scholars as the Ktav Ashuri, Jewish script, square script and block script, is a unicase, unicameral abjad script used in the writing of the Hebrew language and other Jewish languages, most notably ...

in the midst of its Greek text, and 4Q120 uses the Greek transcription of the name, ΙΑΩ. Three later manuscripts use , the name in

Paleo-Hebrew script The Paleo-Hebrew script (), also Palaeo-Hebrew, Proto-Hebrew or Old Hebrew, is the writing system found in Canaanite and Aramaic inscriptions, including pre-Biblical and Biblical Hebrew, from southern Canaan, also known as the biblical kingdoms o ...

: the Greek Minor Prophets Scroll from Nahal Hever, Papyrus Oxyrhynchus 3522 and Papyrus Oxyrhynchus 5101. Other extant ancient fragments of Septuagint or Old Greek manuscripts provide no evidence on the use of the Tetragrammaton, Κύριος, or ΙΑΩ in correspondence with the Hebrew-text Tetragrammaton. They include the oldest known example, Papyrus Rylands 458. Scholars differ on whether in the original Septuagint translations the Tetragrammaton was represented by Κύριος, by ΙΑΩ, by the Tetragrammaton in either normal or Paleo-Hebrew form, or whether different translators used different forms in different books. Frank Shaw argues that the Tetragrammaton continued to be articulated until the second or third century CE and that the use of Ιαω was by no means limited to magical or mystical formulas, but was still normal in more elevated contexts such as that exemplified by Papyrus 4Q120. Shaw considers all theories that posit in the Septuagint a single original form of the divine name as merely based on ''a priori'' assumptions. Accordingly, he declares: "The matter of any (especially single) 'original' form of the divine name in the LXX is too complex, the evidence is too scattered and indefinite, and the various approaches offered for the issue are too simplistic" to account for the actual scribal practices (p. 158). He holds that the earliest stages of the LXX's translation were marked by diversity (p. 262), with the choice of certain divine names depending on the context in which they appear (cf. Gen 4:26; Exod 3:15; 8:22; 28:32; 32:5; and 33:19). He treats of the related blank spaces in some Septuagint manuscripts and the setting of spaces around the divine name in 4Q120 and Papyrus Fouad 266b (p. 265), and repeats that "there was no one 'original' form but different translators had different feelings, theological beliefs, motivations, and practices when it came to their handling of the name" (p. 271). His view has won the support of Anthony R. Meyer, Bob Becking, and (commenting on Shaw's 2011 dissertation on the subject) D.T. Runia. Mogens Müller says that, while no clearly Jewish manuscript of the Septuagint has been found with Κύριος representing the Tetragrammaton, other Jewish writings of the time show that Jews did use the term Κύριος for God, and it was because Christians found it in the Septuagint that they were able to apply it to Christ. In fact, the

deuterocanonical books The deuterocanonical books, meaning 'of, pertaining to, or constituting a second canon', collectively known as the Deuterocanon (DC), are certain books and passages considered to be canonical books of the Old Testament by the Catholic Chur ...

of the Septuagint, written originally in Greek (e.g., Wisdom, 2 and 3 Maccabees), do speak of God as Κύριος and thus show that "the use of κύριος as a representation of must be pre-Christian in origin". Similarly, while consistent use of ''Κύριος'' to represent the Tetragrammaton has been called "a distinguishing mark for any Christian LXX manuscript", Eugen J. Pentiuc says: "No definitive conclusion has been reached thus far." And Sean McDonough denounces as implausible the idea that Κύριος did not appear in the Septuagint before the Christian era. Speaking of the Greek Minor Prophets Scroll from Nahal Hever, which is a kaige recension of the Septuagint, "a revision of the Old Greek text to bring it closer to the Hebrew text of the Bible as it existed in ca. 2nd–1st century BCE" (and thus not necessarily the original text), Kristin De Troyer remarks: "The problem with a recension is that one does not know what is the original form and what the recension. Hence, is the paleo-Hebrew Tetragrammaton secondary – a part of the recension – or proof of the Old Greek text? This debate has not yet been solved." While some interpret the presence of the Tetragrammaton in Papyrus Fouad 266, the oldest Septuagint manuscript in which it appears, as an indication of what was in the original text, others see this manuscript as "an archaizing and hebraizing revision of the earlier translation κύριος". Of this papyrus, De Troyer asks: "Is it a recension or not?" In this regard she says that Emanuel Tov notes that in this manuscript a second scribe inserted the four-letter Tetragrammaton where the first scribe left spaces large enough for the six-letter word Κύριος, and that Pietersma and Hanhart say the papyrus "already contains some pre-

hexapla ''Hexapla'' (), also called ''Origenis Hexaplorum'', is a Textual criticism, critical edition of the Hebrew Bible in six versions, four of them translated into Ancient Greek, Greek, preserved only in fragments. It was an immense and complex wor ...

ric corrections towards a Hebrew text (which would have had the Tetragrammaton). She also mentions Septuagint manuscripts that have Θεός and one that has παντοκράτωρ where the Hebrew text has the Tetragrammaton. She concludes: "It suffices to say that in old Hebrew and Greek witnesses, God has many names. Most if not all were pronounced till about the second century BCE. As slowly onwards there developed a tradition of non-pronunciation, alternatives for the Tetragrammaton appeared. The reading ''Adonai'' was one of them. Finally, before ''Kurios'' became a standard rendering ''Adonai'', the Name of God was rendered with ''Theos''." In the Book of Exodus alone, Θεός represents the Tetragrammaton 41 times. Robert J. Wilkinson says that the Greek Minor Prophets Scroll from Nahal Hever is also a kaige recension and thus not strictly a Septuagint text.

Origen Origen of Alexandria (), also known as Origen Adamantius, was an Early Christianity, early Christian scholar, Asceticism#Christianity, ascetic, and Christian theology, theologian who was born and spent the first half of his career in Early cent ...

(''Commentary on Psalms'' 2.2) said that in the most accurate manuscripts the name was written in an older form of the Hebrew characters, the paleo-Hebrew letters, not the square: "In the more accurate exemplars the (divine) name is written in Hebrew characters; not, however, in the current script, but in the most ancient." While Pietersma interprets this statement as referring to the Septuagint, Wilkinson says one might assume that Origen refers specifically to the version of

Aquila of Sinope Aquila (Hebrew language, Hebrew: עֲקִילַס ''ʿăqīlas'', Floruit, fl. 130 Common Era, CE) of Sinope (modern-day Sinop, Turkey; ) was a translator of the Hebrew Bible into Greek language, Greek, a proselyte, and disciple of Rabbi Akiva. R ...

, which follows the Hebrew text very closely, but he may perhaps refer to Greek versions in general.

Manuscripts of the Septuagint and later Greek renderings

The great majority of extant manuscripts of the Old Testament in Greek, complete or fragmentary, dated to the ninth century CE or earlier, employ Κύριος to represent the Tetragrammaton of the Hebrew text. The following do not. They include the oldest now extant. # Manuscripts of the Septuagint or recensions thereof #* 1st century BCE #** 4QpapLXXLev – fragments of the Book of Leviticus, chapters 1 to 5. In two verses: 3:12; 4:27 the Tetragrammaton of the Hebrew Bible is represented by Greek ΙΑΩ. #** Papyrus Fouad 266b (848) – fragments of Deuteronomy, chapters 10 to 33. The Tetragrammaton appears in square Hebrew/Aramaic script. According to a disputed view, the first copyist left a blank space marked with a dot, and another inscribed the letters. #* 1st century CE #** Papyrus Oxyrhynchus 3522 – contains parts of two verses of chapter 42 of the Book of Job and has the Tetragrammaton in paleo-Hebrew letters. #** Greek Minor Prophets Scroll from Nahal Hever – in three fragments whose contents were published separately. #*** Se2grXII (LXX) has the Tetragrammaton in 1 place. #*** 8HevXII a (LXX) in 24 places, in whole or part. #*** 8HevXII b (LXX) in 4 places. #* 1st to 2nd century #** Papyrus Oxyrhynchus 5101 – contains fragments of the Book of Psalms. It has YHWH in Paleo-Hebrew script. #* 3rd century CE #** Papyrus Oxyrhynchus 1007 – contains Genesis 2 and 3. The divine name is written with a double

yodh Yodh (also spelled jodh, yod, or jod) is the tenth letter of the Semitic abjads, including Phoenician ''yōd'' 𐤉, Hebrew ''yod'' , Aramaic ''yod'' 𐡉, Syriac ''yōḏ'' ܝ, and Arabic ''yāʾ'' . It is also related to the Ancient Nort ...

. #** Papyrus Oxyrhynchus 656 – fragments of the Book of Genesis, chapters 14 to 27. Has Κύριος where the first copyist left blank spaces #** Papyrus Berlin 17213 – fragments of the Book of Genesis, chapter 19. One space is left blank. Emanuel Tov thinks it indicated the end of a paragraph. It has been dated to 3rd century CE. # Manuscripts of Greek translations made by Symmachus and

Aquila of Sinope Aquila (Hebrew language, Hebrew: עֲקִילַס ''ʿăqīlas'', Floruit, fl. 130 Common Era, CE) of Sinope (modern-day Sinop, Turkey; ) was a translator of the Hebrew Bible into Greek language, Greek, a proselyte, and disciple of Rabbi Akiva. R ...

(2nd century CE) #* 3rd century CE #** Papyrus Vindobonensis Greek 39777. Has the Tetragrammaton in archaic Hebrew script. #* 5th century CE #** AqTaylor, this manuscript of the Aquila version is dated after the middle of the 5th century, but not later than the beginning of the 6th century. #** AqBurkitt – a palimpsest manuscript of the Aquila version dated late 5th century or early 6th century. # Manuscripts with Hexaplaric elements #* 6th century CE #** Codex Marchalianus – In addition to the Septuagint text of the prophets (with ), the manuscript contains marginal notes from a hand "not much later than the original scribe" indicating

Hexapla ''Hexapla'' (), also called ''Origenis Hexaplorum'', is a Textual criticism, critical edition of the Hebrew Bible in six versions, four of them translated into Ancient Greek, Greek, preserved only in fragments. It was an immense and complex wor ...

ric variations, each identified as from Aquila, Symmachus or Theodotion. Marginal notes on some of the prophets contain πιπι to indicate that in the text corresponds to the Tetragrammaton. Two marginal notes at Ezekiel 1:2 and 11:1 use the form with reference to the Tetragrammaton. #* 7th century CE #** Taylor-Schechter 12.182 – a Hexapla manuscript with Tetragrammaton in Greek letters ΠΙΠΙ. It has Hebrew text transliterated into Greek, Aquila, Symmachus and the Septuagint. #* 9th century CE #** Ambrosiano O 39 sup. – the latest Greek manuscript containing the name of God is Origen's''

Hexapla ''Hexapla'' (), also called ''Origenis Hexaplorum'', is a Textual criticism, critical edition of the Hebrew Bible in six versions, four of them translated into Ancient Greek, Greek, preserved only in fragments. It was an immense and complex wor ...

'', transmitting among other translations the text of the Septuagint, Aquila, Symmachus and Theodotion, and in three other unidentified Greek translations (Quinta, Sextus and Septima). This codex, copied from a much earlier original, comes from the late 9th century, and is stored in the Biblioteca Ambrosiana.

Patristic writings

Tetragrammaton at 5th Chapel of the Palace of Versailles France

According to the

Catholic Encyclopedia ''The'' ''Catholic Encyclopedia: An International Work of Reference on the Constitution, Doctrine, Discipline, and History of the Catholic Church'', also referred to as the ''Old Catholic Encyclopedia'' and the ''Original Catholic Encyclopedi ...

(1910) and B. D. Eerdmans: *

Diodorus Siculus Diodorus Siculus or Diodorus of Sicily (; 1st century BC) was an ancient Greece, ancient Greek historian from Sicily. He is known for writing the monumental Universal history (genre), universal history ''Bibliotheca historica'', in forty ...

(1st century BCE) writes (Iao); *

Irenaeus Irenaeus ( or ; ; ) was a Greeks, Greek bishop noted for his role in guiding and expanding Christianity, Christian communities in the southern regions of present-day France and, more widely, for the development of Christian theology by oppos ...

(d. c. 202) reports that the Gnostics formed a compound (Iaoth) with the last syllable of Sabaoth. He also reports that the Valentinian heretics use (Iao); *

Clement of Alexandria Titus Flavius Clemens, also known as Clement of Alexandria (; – ), was a Christian theology, Christian theologian and philosopher who taught at the Catechetical School of Alexandria. Among his pupils were Origen and Alexander of Jerusalem. A ...

(d. c. 215) reports: "the mystic name of four letters which was affixed to those alone to whom the adytum was accessible, is called " (Iaoú); manuscript variants also have the forms (Iaoúe) and . *

Origen Origen of Alexandria (), also known as Origen Adamantius, was an Early Christianity, early Christian scholar, Asceticism#Christianity, ascetic, and Christian theology, theologian who was born and spent the first half of his career in Early cent ...

(d. c. 254), (Iao); * Porphyry (d. c. 305) according to Eusebius (died 339), (Ieuo); * Epiphanius (died 404), who was born in Palestine and spent a considerable part of his life there, gives (Ia) and (pronounced at that time /ja'vε/) and explains Ἰάβε as meaning He who was and is and always exists. *

Jerome Jerome (; ; ; – 30 September 420), also known as Jerome of Stridon, was an early Christian presbyter, priest, Confessor of the Faith, confessor, theologian, translator, and historian; he is commonly known as Saint Jerome. He is best known ...

(died 420) speaks of certain Greek writers who misunderstood the Hebrew letters (read right-to-left) as the Greek letters (read left-to-right), thus changing YHWH to ''pipi''. * Theodoret (d. c. 457) writes (Iao); he also reports that the

Samaritans Samaritans (; ; ; ), are an ethnoreligious group originating from the Hebrews and Israelites of the ancient Near East. They are indigenous to Samaria, a historical region of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah that ...

say or (both pronounced at that time /ja'vε/), while the Jews say (Aia). (The latter is probably not but ''Ehyeh'' = "I am " or "I will be", which the Jews counted among the names of God.) * (Pseudo-)Jerome (4th/5th or 9th century),: ''IAHO''. This work was traditionally attributed to

Jerome Jerome (; ; ; – 30 September 420), also known as Jerome of Stridon, was an early Christian presbyter, priest, Confessor of the Faith, confessor, theologian, translator, and historian; he is commonly known as Saint Jerome. He is best known ...

and, in spite of the view of one modern writer who in 1936 said it is "now believed to be genuine and to be dated before CE 392" is still generally attributed to the 9th century and to be non-authentic.

Peshitta

The

Peshitta The Peshitta ( ''or'' ') is the standard Syriac edition of the Bible for Syriac Christian churches and traditions that follow the liturgies of the Syriac Rites. The Peshitta is originally and traditionally written in the Classical Syriac d ...

( Syriac translation), probably in the second century, uses the word "Lord" (, pronounced ''māryā'' or ''moryo'' (Western pronunciation) for the Tetragrammaton.

Vulgate

The

Vulgate The Vulgate () is a late-4th-century Bible translations into Latin, Latin translation of the Bible. It is largely the work of Saint Jerome who, in 382, had been commissioned by Pope Damasus I to revise the Gospels used by the Diocese of ...

(Latin translation) made from the Hebrew in the 4th century CE, uses the word ("Lord"), a translation of the Hebrew word ''Adonai'', for the Tetragrammaton. The Vulgate translation, though made not from the Septuagint but from the Hebrew text, did not depart from the practice used in the Septuagint. Thus, for most of its history, Christianity's translations of the Scriptures have used equivalents of ''Adonai'' to represent the Tetragrammaton. Only at about the beginning of the 16th century did Christian translations of the Bible appear combining the vowels of ''Adonai'' with the four (consonantal) letters of the Tetragrammaton.In the 7th paragraph of ''Introduction to the Old Testament of the New English Bible''
Sir Godfry Driver wrote
, "The early translators generally substituted 'Lord' for HWH ..The Reformers preferred Jehovah, which first appeared as ''Iehouah'' in 1530 A.D., in Tyndale's translation of the Pentateuch (Exodus 6.3), from which it passed into other Protestant Bibles."

Usage in religious traditions

Judaism

Especially due to the existence of the Mesha Stele, the Jahwist tradition found in , and ancient Hebrew and Greek texts, biblical scholars widely hold that the Tetragrammaton and other names of God were spoken by the ancient

Israelites Israelites were a Hebrew language, Hebrew-speaking ethnoreligious group, consisting of tribes that lived in Canaan during the Iron Age. Modern scholarship describes the Israelites as emerging from indigenous Canaanites, Canaanite populations ...

and their neighbours. By at least the 3rd century BCE, the name was not pronounced in normal speech, but only in certain ritual contexts. The Talmud relays this change occurred after the death of Simeon the Just (either Simon I or his great-great-grandson Simon II).

Philo Philo of Alexandria (; ; ; ), also called , was a Hellenistic Jewish philosopher who lived in Alexandria, in the Roman province of Egypt. The only event in Philo's life that can be decisively dated is his representation of the Alexandrian J ...

calls the name ineffable, and says that it is lawful only for those "whose ears and tongues are purified by wisdom to hear and utter it in a holy place", that is, the priests in the Temple. In another passage, commenting on , Philo writes, "If any one... should even dare to utter his name unseasonably, let him expect the penalty of death." Some time after the destruction of the

Second Temple The Second Temple () was the Temple in Jerusalem that replaced Solomon's Temple, which was destroyed during the Siege of Jerusalem (587 BC), Babylonian siege of Jerusalem in 587 BCE. It was constructed around 516 BCE and later enhanced by Herod ...

, the spoken use of God's name as it was written ceased altogether, though knowledge of the pronunciation was perpetuated in rabbinic schools. Rabbinic sources suggest that the name of God was pronounced only once a year, by the high priest, on the Day of Atonement. Others, including

Maimonides Moses ben Maimon (1138–1204), commonly known as Maimonides (, ) and also referred to by the Hebrew acronym Rambam (), was a Sephardic rabbi and Jewish philosophy, philosopher who became one of the most prolific and influential Torah schola ...

, claim that the name was pronounced daily in the

liturgy Liturgy is the customary public ritual of worship performed by a religious group. As a religious phenomenon, liturgy represents a communal response to and participation in the sacred through activities reflecting praise, thanksgiving, remembra ...

of the

Temple A temple (from the Latin ) is a place of worship, a building used for spiritual rituals and activities such as prayer and sacrifice. By convention, the specially built places of worship of some religions are commonly called "temples" in Engli ...

in the priestly blessing of worshippers, after the daily sacrifice; in

synagogue A synagogue, also called a shul or a temple, is a place of worship for Jews and Samaritans. It is a place for prayer (the main sanctuary and sometimes smaller chapels) where Jews attend religious services or special ceremonies such as wed ...

s, though, a substitute (probably "Adonai") was used. According to the

Talmud The Talmud (; ) is the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary source of Jewish religious law (''halakha'') and Jewish theology. Until the advent of Haskalah#Effects, modernity, in nearly all Jewish communities, the Talmud was the cen ...

, in the last generations before the fall of

Jerusalem Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...

, the name was pronounced in a low tone so that the sounds were lost in the chant of the priests. Since the destruction of Second Temple of Jerusalem in 70 CE, the Tetragrammaton has no longer been pronounced in the liturgy. However the pronunciation was still known in

Babylonia Babylonia (; , ) was an Ancient history, ancient Akkadian language, Akkadian-speaking state and cultural area based in the city of Babylon in central-southern Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq and parts of Kuwait, Syria and Iran). It emerged as a ...

in the latter part of the 4th century.

Spoken prohibitions

The vehemence with which the utterance of the name is denounced in the

Mishnah The Mishnah or the Mishna (; , from the verb ''šānā'', "to study and review", also "secondary") is the first written collection of the Jewish oral traditions that are known as the Oral Torah. Having been collected in the 3rd century CE, it is ...

suggests that use of the name Yahweh was unacceptable in rabbinical Judaism. "He who pronounces the Name with its own letters has no part in the world to come!" Such is the prohibition of pronouncing the Name as written that it is sometimes called the "Ineffable", "Unutterable", or "Distinctive Name", or "Explicit Name" (" Shem HaMephorash" in Hebrew).

Halakha ''Halakha'' ( ; , ), also Romanization of Hebrew, transliterated as ''halacha'', ''halakhah'', and ''halocho'' ( ), is the collective body of Judaism, Jewish religious laws that are derived from the Torah, Written and Oral Torah. ''Halakha'' is ...

prescribes that although the Name is written "yodh he waw he", if not preceded by (, ) then it is only to be pronounced "Adonai" and if preceded by "Adonai" then it is only to be pronounced as "Our God" (, ), or, in rare cases, as a repetition of Adonai, e.g., the Thirteen Attributes of Mercy (, ) in Exodus 34:6–7; the latter names too are regarded as holy names, and are only to be pronounced in prayer."They he Priests, when reciting the Priestly Blessing, when the Temple stoodrecite od'sname – i.e., the name ''yod-hei-vav-hei'', as it is written. This is what is referred to as the 'explicit name' in all sources. In the country hat is, outside the Temple it is read sing another one of God's names א-ד-נ-י ('Adonai'), for only in the Temple is this name

f God F, or f, is the sixth letter of the Latin alphabet and many modern alphabets influenced by it, including the modern English alphabet and the alphabets of all other modern western European languages. Its name in English is ''ef'' (pronounc ...

recited as it is written." – '' Mishneh Torah''

Maimonides Moses ben Maimon (1138–1204), commonly known as Maimonides (, ) and also referred to by the Hebrew acronym Rambam (), was a Sephardic rabbi and Jewish philosophy, philosopher who became one of the most prolific and influential Torah schola ...

, Laws of Prayer and Priestly Blessings, 14:10 Thus when someone wants to refer in third person to either the written or spoken Name, the term ''HaShem'' "the Name" is used;Stanley S. Seidner, "HaShem: Uses through the Ages", Unpublished paper, Rabbinical Society Seminar, Los Angeles, California, 1987. and this handle itself can also be used in prayer.For example, in the common utterance and praise, "Barukh Hashem" (Blessed .e. the source of allis Hashem), or "Hashem yishmor" (God protect s The Masoretes added vowel points (

niqqud In Hebrew orthography, niqqud or nikud ( or ) is a system of diacritical signs used to represent vowels or distinguish between alternative pronunciations of letters of the Hebrew alphabet. Several such diacritical systems were developed in the Ea ...

) and cantillation marks to the manuscripts to indicate vowel usage and for use in ritual chanting of readings from the

Bible The Bible is a collection of religious texts that are central to Christianity and Judaism, and esteemed in other Abrahamic religions such as Islam. The Bible is an anthology (a compilation of texts of a variety of forms) originally writt ...

in

Jewish prayer Jewish prayer (, ; plural ; , plural ; Yinglish: davening from Yiddish 'pray') is the prayer recitation that forms part of the observance of Rabbinic Judaism. These prayers, often with instructions and commentary, are found in the ' ...

in

synagogue A synagogue, also called a shul or a temple, is a place of worship for Jews and Samaritans. It is a place for prayer (the main sanctuary and sometimes smaller chapels) where Jews attend religious services or special ceremonies such as wed ...

s. To they added the vowels for (, , Pluralis majestatis taken as singular), the word to use when the text was read. While "HaShem" is the most common way to reference "the Name", the terms "HaMaqom" (lit. "The Place", i.e. "The Omnipresent") and "Raḥmana" (Aramaic, "Merciful") are used in the mishna and

gemara The Gemara (also transliterated Gemarah, or in Yiddish Gemore) is an essential component of the Talmud, comprising a collection of rabbinical analyses and commentaries on the Mishnah and presented in 63 books. The term is derived from the Aram ...

, still used in the phrases "HaMaqom y'naḥem ethḥem" ("may The Omnipresent console you"), the traditional phrase used in sitting

Shiva Shiva (; , ), also known as Mahadeva (; , , Help:IPA/Sanskrit, ɐɦaːd̪eːʋɐh and Hara, is one of the Hindu deities, principal deities of Hinduism. He is the God in Hinduism, Supreme Being in Shaivism, one of the major traditions w ...

and "Raḥmana l'tzlan" ("may the Merciful save us" i.e. "God forbid").

Written prohibitions

The written Tetragrammaton, as well as six other names of God, must be treated with special sanctity. They cannot be disposed of regularly, lest they be desecrated, but are usually put in long-term storage or buried in Jewish cemeteries in order to retire them from use. Similarly, writing the Tetragrammaton (or these other names) unnecessarily is prohibited, so as to avoid having them treated disrespectfully, an action that is forbidden. To guard the sanctity of the Name, sometimes a letter is substituted by a different letter in writing (e.g. יקוק), or the letters are separated by one or more hyphens, a practice applied also to the English name "God", which some Jews write as "G-d". Most Jewish authorities say that this practice is not obligatory for the English name.

Kabbalah

Kabbalistic tradition holds that the correct pronunciation is known to a select few people in each generation, it is not generally known what this pronunciation is. There are two main schools of Kabbalah arising in 13th century Spain. These are called Theosophic Kabbalah represented by Rabbi Moshe De Leon and the Zohar, and the Kabbalah of Names or Prophetic Kabbalah whose main representative is Rabbi Abraham Abulafia of Saragossa. Rabbi Abulafia wrote many wisdom books and prophetic books where the name is used for meditation purposes from 1271 onwards. Abulafia put a lot of attention on Exodus 15 and the Songs of Moses. In this song it says "Yehovah is a Man of War, Yehovah is his name". For Abulafia the goal of prophecy was for a man to come to the level of prophecy and be called "Yehovah a man of war". Abulafia also used the tetragrammaton in a spiritual war against his spiritual enemies. For example, he prophesied in his book "The Sign", "Therefore, thus said YHWH, the God of Israel: Have no fear of the enemy" (See Hylton, A The Prophetic Jew Abraham Abulafia, 2015). Moshe Chaim Luzzatto,In קל"ח פתחי חכמה by Rabbi Moshe Chaim Luzzato, Opening #31; English translation in book "138 Openings of Wisdom" by Rabbi Avraham Greenbaum, 2008, also viewable at http://www.breslev.co.il/articles/spirituality_and_faith/kabbalah_and_mysticism/the_name_of_havayah.aspx?id=10847&language=english , accessed 12 March 2012 says that the tree of the Tetragrammaton "unfolds" in accordance with the intrinsic nature of its letters, "in the same order in which they appear in the Name, in the mystery of ten and the mystery of four." Namely, the upper cusp of the ''Yod'' is Arich Anpin and the main body of ''Yod'' is and

Abba ABBA ( ) were a Swedish pop group formed in Stockholm in 1972 by Agnetha Fältskog, Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson, and Anni-Frid Lyngstad. They are one of the most popular and successful musical groups of all time, and are one of the List ...

; the first ''Hei'' is Imma; the ''Vav'' is Ze`ir Anpin and the second ''Hei'' is Nukvah. It unfolds in this aforementioned order and "in the mystery of the four expansions" that are constituted by the following various spellings of the letters: ע"ב/''`AV'' : יו"ד ה"י וי"ו ה"י, so called "`AV" according to its

gematria In numerology, gematria (; or , plural or ) is the practice of assigning a numerical value to a name, word, or phrase by reading it as a number, or sometimes by using an alphanumeric cipher. The letters of the alphabets involved have standar ...

value ע"ב=70+2=72. ס"ג/''SaG'': יו"ד ה"י וא"ו ה"י, gematria 63. מ"ה/''MaH'': יו"ד ה"א וא"ו ה"א, gematria 45. ב"ן/''BaN'': יו"ד ה"ה ו"ו ה"ה, gematria 52. Luzzatto summarises, "In sum, all that exists is founded on the mystery of this Name and upon the mystery of these letters of which it consists. This means that all the different orders and laws are all drawn after and come under the order of these four letters. This is not one particular pathway but rather the general path, which includes everything that exists in the

Sefirot Sefirot (; , plural of ), meaning '' emanations'', are the 10 attributes/emanations in Kabbalah, through which Ein Sof ("infinite space") reveals itself and continuously creates both the physical realm and the seder hishtalshelut (the chained ...

in all their details and which brings everything under its order." Another parallel is drawn between the four letters of the Tetragrammaton and the Four Worlds: the י is associated with Atziluth, the first ה with Beri'ah, the ו with Yetzirah, and final ה with Assiah. Tetragrammaton-Tetractys

There are some who believe that the

tetractys The tetractys (), or tetrad, or the tetractys of the decad is a triangular number, triangular figure consisting of ten points arranged in four rows: one, two, three, and four points in each row, which is the geometrical representation of the fourt ...

and its mysteries influenced the early kabbalists. A Hebrew tetractys in a similar way has the letters of the Tetragrammaton (the four lettered name of God in Hebrew scripture) inscribed on the ten positions of the tetractys, from right to left. It has been argued that the Kabbalistic

Tree of Life The tree of life is a fundamental archetype in many of the world's mythology, mythological, religion, religious, and philosophy, philosophical traditions. It is closely related to the concept of the sacred tree.Giovino, Mariana (2007). ''The ...

, with its ten spheres of emanation, is in some way connected to the tetractys, but its form is not that of a triangle. The occult writer

Dion Fortune Dion Fortune (born Violet Mary Firth, 6 December 1890 – 6 or 8 January 1946) was a British occultist, ceremonial magician, and writer. She was a co-founder of the Fraternity of the Inner Light, an occult organisation that promoted philoso ...

says: (The first two-dimensional figure is the

triangle A triangle is a polygon with three corners and three sides, one of the basic shapes in geometry. The corners, also called ''vertices'', are zero-dimensional points while the sides connecting them, also called ''edges'', are one-dimension ...

.) (The first three-dimensional solid is the

tetrahedron In geometry, a tetrahedron (: tetrahedra or tetrahedrons), also known as a triangular pyramid, is a polyhedron composed of four triangular Face (geometry), faces, six straight Edge (geometry), edges, and four vertex (geometry), vertices. The tet ...

.) The relationship between geometrical shapes and the first four

Sephirot Sefirot (; , plural of ), meaning '' emanations'', are the 10 attributes/emanations in Kabbalah, through which Ein Sof ("infinite space") reveals itself and continuously creates both the physical realm and the seder hishtalshelut (the chained ...

is analogous to the geometrical correlations in tetractys, shown above under Pythagorean Symbol, and unveils the relevance of the Tree of Life with the tetractys.

Samaritans

The

Samaritans Samaritans (; ; ; ), are an ethnoreligious group originating from the Hebrews and Israelites of the ancient Near East. They are indigenous to Samaria, a historical region of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah that ...

shared the taboo of the Jews about the utterance of the name, and there is no evidence that its pronunciation was common Samaritan practice. However Sanhedrin 10:1 includes the comment of Rabbi Mana II, "for example those Kutim who take an oath" would also have no share in the

world to come The world to come, age to come, heaven on Earth, and the Kingdom of God are eschatology, eschatological phrases reflecting the belief that the World (theology), current world or Dispensation (period), current age is flawed or cursed and will be r ...

, which suggests that Mana thought some Samaritans used the name in making oaths. (Their priests have preserved a liturgical pronunciation "Yahwe" or "Yahwa" to the present day.) As with Jews, ''Shema'' (שמא, "the Name") remains the everyday usage of the name among Samaritans, paralleling the Jewish use of ''HaShem'' (השם, "the Name") in Hebrew. This reading of the tetragrammaton by Samaritans dates back to at least the 4th century CE, as evidenced in two poems by the Samaritan author Marqah.

Christianity

It is assumed that early Jewish Christians inherited from Jews the practice of reading "Lord" where the Tetragrammaton appears in the Hebrew text (and where a few Greek manuscripts use it in the midst of their Greek translation). Gentile Christians, primarily non-Hebrew speaking and using Greek Scripture texts, may have read Κύριος ("Lord"), as in the Greek text of the

New Testament The New Testament (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus in Christianity, Jesus, as well as events relating to Christianity in the 1st century, first-century Christianit ...

and in their copies of the Greek Old Testament. This practice continued into the Latin

Vulgate The Vulgate () is a late-4th-century Bible translations into Latin, Latin translation of the Bible. It is largely the work of Saint Jerome who, in 382, had been commissioned by Pope Damasus I to revise the Gospels used by the Diocese of ...

where ''Dominus'' ("Lord") represented the Tetragrammaton in the Latin text. At the Reformation, the

Luther Bible The Luther Bible () is a German language Bible translation by the Protestant reformer Martin Luther. A New Testament translation by Luther was first published in September 1522; the completed Bible contained 75 books, including the Old Testament ...

used capitalized ''Herr'' ("Lord") in the German text of the Old Testament to represent the Tetragrammaton. In Christianity, when the Tetragrammaton is vocalized, the forms ''

Yahweh Yahweh was an Ancient Semitic religion, ancient Semitic deity of Weather god, weather and List of war deities, war in the History of the ancient Levant, ancient Levant, the national god of the kingdoms of Kingdom of Judah, Judah and Kingdom ...

'' or ''

Jehovah Jehovah () is a Romanization, Latinization of the Hebrew language, Hebrew , one Tiberian vocalization, vocalization of the Tetragrammaton (YHWH), the proper name of the God in Judaism, God of Israel in the Hebrew BibleOld Testament. The Tetr ...

'' are used. Jah or Yah is an abbreviation of Jahweh/Yahweh, and often sees usage by Christians in the interjection " Hallelujah", meaning "Praise Jah", which is used to give God glory.

Christian translations

The

Septuagint The Septuagint ( ), sometimes referred to as the Greek Old Testament or The Translation of the Seventy (), and abbreviated as LXX, is the earliest extant Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible from the original Biblical Hebrew. The full Greek ...

(Greek translation), the

Vulgate The Vulgate () is a late-4th-century Bible translations into Latin, Latin translation of the Bible. It is largely the work of Saint Jerome who, in 382, had been commissioned by Pope Damasus I to revise the Gospels used by the Diocese of ...

(Latin translation), and the

Peshitta The Peshitta ( ''or'' ') is the standard Syriac edition of the Bible for Syriac Christian churches and traditions that follow the liturgies of the Syriac Rites. The Peshitta is originally and traditionally written in the Classical Syriac d ...

( Syriac translation) use the word "Lord" (, ''kyrios'', , and , ''moryo'' respectively). Use of the Septuagint by Christians in polemics with Jews led to its abandonment by the latter, making it a specifically Christian text. From it Christians made translations into Coptic,

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

, Slavonic and other languages used in

Oriental Orthodoxy The Oriental Orthodox Churches are Eastern Christian churches adhering to Miaphysite Christology, with approximately 50 million members worldwide. The Oriental Orthodox Churches adhere to the Nicene Christian tradition. Oriental Orthodoxy is ...

and the

Eastern Orthodox Church The Eastern Orthodox Church, officially the Orthodox Catholic Church, and also called the Greek Orthodox Church or simply the Orthodox Church, is List of Christian denominations by number of members, one of the three major doctrinal and ...

, whose liturgies and doctrinal declarations are largely a cento of texts from the Septuagint, which they consider to be inspired at least as much as the Masoretic Text. Within the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Greek text remains the norm for texts in all languages, with particular reference to the wording used in prayers. The Septuagint, with its use of Κύριος to represent the Tetragrammaton, was the basis also for Christian translations associated with the West, in particular the Vetus Itala, which survives in some parts of the liturgy of the

Latin Church The Latin Church () is the largest autonomous () particular church within the Catholic Church, whose members constitute the vast majority of the 1.3 billion Catholics. The Latin Church is one of 24 Catholic particular churches and liturgical ...

, and the

Gothic Bible The Gothic Bible or Wulfila Bible is the Christian Bible in the Gothic language, which was spoken by the Eastern Germanic (Goths, Gothic) tribes in the Early Middle Ages. The translation was allegedly made by the Arianism, Arian bishop and m ...

. Christian translations of the Bible into English commonly use "" in place of the Tetragrammaton in most passages, often in

small capitals In typography, small caps (short for small capitals) are characters typeset with glyphs that resemble uppercase letters but reduced in height and weight close to the surrounding lowercase letters or text figures. Small caps are used in running ...

(or in all caps), so as to distinguish it from other words translated as "Lord".

Eastern Orthodoxy

The

Eastern Orthodox Church The Eastern Orthodox Church, officially the Orthodox Catholic Church, and also called the Greek Orthodox Church or simply the Orthodox Church, is List of Christian denominations by number of members, one of the three major doctrinal and ...

considers the Septuagint text, which uses Κύριος (Lord), to be the authoritative text of the Old Testament, and in its liturgical books and prayers it uses Κύριος in place of the Tetragrammaton in texts derived from the Bible.

Catholicism

BASILICA OF ST LOUIS KING OF FRANCE MISSOURI USA Near the Gateway Arch TETRAGRAMMATON

In the

Catholic Church The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

, the first edition of the official Vatican '' Nova Vulgata Bibliorum Sacrorum Editio, editio typica'', published in 1979, used the traditional ''Dominus'' when rendering the Tetragrammaton in the overwhelming majority of places where it appears; however, it also used the form ''Iahveh'' for rendering the Tetragrammaton in three known places: * Exodus 3:15 * Exodus 15:3 * Exodus 17:15 In the second edition of the '' Nova Vulgata Bibliorum Sacrorum Editio, editio typica altera'', published in 1986, these few occurrences of the form ''Iahveh'' were replaced with ''Dominus'', in keeping with the long-standing Catholic tradition of avoiding direct usage of the Ineffable Name. On 29 June 2008, the

Holy See The Holy See (, ; ), also called the See of Rome, the Petrine See or the Apostolic See, is the central governing body of the Catholic Church and Vatican City. It encompasses the office of the pope as the Bishops in the Catholic Church, bishop ...

reacted to the then still recent practice of pronouncing, within Catholic

liturgy Liturgy is the customary public ritual of worship performed by a religious group. As a religious phenomenon, liturgy represents a communal response to and participation in the sacred through activities reflecting praise, thanksgiving, remembra ...

, the name of God represented by the Tetragrammaton. As examples of such vocalisation it mentioned "Yahweh" and "Yehovah". The early Christians, it said, followed the example of the Septuagint in replacing the name of God with "the Lord", a practice with important theological implications for their use of "the Lord" in reference to Jesus, as in and other New Testament texts. It therefore directed that, "in liturgical celebrations, in songs and prayers the name of God in the form of the ''Tetragrammaton'' YHWH is neither to be used or pronounced"; and that translations of Biblical texts for liturgical use are to follow the practice of the Greek Septuagint and the Latin Vulgate, replacing the divine name with "the Lord" or, in some contexts, "God". The

United States Conference of Catholic Bishops The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) is the episcopal conference of the Catholic Church in the United States. Founded in 2001 after the merger of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops (NCCB) and United States Catholic C ...

welcomed this instruction, adding that it "provides also an opportunity to offer catechesis for the faithful as an encouragement to show reverence for the Name of God in daily life, emphasizing the power of language as an act of devotion and worship".

Lutheranism and Anglicanism

In the

Lutheran Lutheranism is a major branch of Protestantism that emerged under the work of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German friar and Protestant Reformers, reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practices of the Catholic Church launched ...

and

Anglican Anglicanism, also known as Episcopalianism in some countries, is a Western Christianity, Western Christian tradition which developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the ...

psalters, the word in "small capital letters s usedto represent the tetragrammaton YHWH, the personal name of the deity". However, the Psalter of the 1979 Book of Common Prayer used by the Protestant Episcopal Church of the United States of America uses ''

Yahweh Yahweh was an Ancient Semitic religion, ancient Semitic deity of Weather god, weather and List of war deities, war in the History of the ancient Levant, ancient Levant, the national god of the kingdoms of Kingdom of Judah, Judah and Kingdom ...

'' in two places, Psalms 68:4 and Psalms 83:18. Also the Hymnal 1982 as used by the Episcopal Church uses the hymn, "Guide me, O thou great ''

Jehovah Jehovah () is a Romanization, Latinization of the Hebrew language, Hebrew , one Tiberian vocalization, vocalization of the Tetragrammaton (YHWH), the proper name of the God in Judaism, God of Israel in the Hebrew BibleOld Testament. The Tetr ...

''", Hymn 690 The Christian Life. Aside from those instances, is typically used in the Liturgy of the Episcopal Church.

Translations preserving Hebraic form of Tetragrammaton

Since 1950, there are a number of Sacred Name Bibles that have been translated with the conviction that Hebraic forms for the Tetragrammaton and other divine names should be preserved in translating both Hebrew and Greek Scriptures. They have done this by transliteration or the use of Hebrew letters in the text. Some even use Paleo-Hebrew letters to write these names, such as ''The Besorah''.

Islam

While the

Qur'an The Quran, also romanized Qur'an or Koran, is the central religious text of Islam, believed by Muslims to be a revelation directly from God ('' Allāh''). It is organized in 114 chapters (, ) which consist of individual verses ('). Besides ...

does not explicitly mention the tetragrammaton, it appears to be well-aware of the name reflecting knowledge of its meaning, paralleling interpretations from early rabbinic traditions. The absence of the tetragrammaton may point to the Qur'an's oral transmission, especially since it sometimes replaces the tetragrammaton with "Lord" when it re-articulates passages in the Hebrew Bible that contain the tetragrammaton. Thus, the Qur'an appears to also avoid the vocalization of the tetragrammaton no differently than the Jewish communities with whom it was in conversation during Late Antiquity.

Usage in art

Since the 16th century, artists have been using the tetragrammaton as a symbol for God, or for divine illumination. Protestant artists avoided to allegorize God in human form, but rather wrote the Hebrew name of God. This was done in book illustrations since 1530, then on coins and medals as well. Since the 17th century, both Protestant and Catholic artists have used the tetragrammaton in church decoration, on top of altars, or in center of frescos, often in rays of light or in a triangle.

References

Notes

Citations

Sources

* * * * * *

External links

* * {{Authority control Kabbalistic words and phrases Magic words Yahweh Sacred Name Movement es:Yahveh#Escritura

Four letters

Etymology

Vocalisation

YHWH and Hebrew script

Yahweh

Non-biblical texts

Texts with Tetragrammaton

Texts with similar theonyms

Magical papyri

Vernacular evidence

Hebrew Bible

Masoretic Text

Leningrad Codex

Dead Sea Scrolls

Septuagint

Manuscripts of the Septuagint and later Greek renderings

Patristic writings

Peshitta

Vulgate

Usage in religious traditions

Judaism

Spoken prohibitions

Written prohibitions

Kabbalah

Samaritans

Christianity

Christian translations

Eastern Orthodoxy

Catholicism

Lutheranism and Anglicanism

Translations preserving Hebraic form of Tetragrammaton

Islam

Usage in art

See also

References

Notes

Citations

Sources

External links