Why Not the Name Yahweh?
There are many theories of how to say the divine name of our Creator from the Tetragrammaton—'YHWH'. One of the most popular is the name 'Yahweh'. The idea that YHWH is pronounced Yahweh is championed by religious leaders and experts. However, most of these religious leaders and experts will also tell you that His name is not that important!
In the oldest text of the Bible—the When YHWH revealed His name to Moses, He also revealed what it means—"I AM that I AM (Exodus 3:14)." In Hebrew, He said, "AhaYaH asher AhaYaH." The word "ahaYaH" means "I AM" or "I exist
."
It is clear that the 'YH' in 'YHWH' is 'YaH'. 'Hayah' is a form of another word that means the same thing: 'Hawah'. We know that 'Wah' was used as a shortened name of YHWH from a few Hebrew names. For example, 'Dodawah' was the father of a prophet named Eliezer, and his name is mentioned in 2 Chronicles Chapter 20 Verse 37. His name means 'beloved of YHWH'. The only part of his name that is similar to YHWH is the WH at the end of his name. And how is it said? "wah" or "oo-ah".
So, in the first person, our Father called Himself "AhaYaH asher AhaYaH", meaning "I AM that I AM", but when Moses doubts what he should say to the Hebrews, he is instructed by our Father in Exodus Chapter 3 Verse 15 to relay to them our Father's Name in the third person—"YaHuWaH", which means 'He who exists (eternally)'—and so when we call on our Father, we call on Him in the correct grammar form of the third person and not the first person, which is what our Father calls Himself...
Exodus Chapter 3 Verse 15
And the Almighty says again to Moses, "Thus you say to the sons of Israel: YHWH (YaHuWaH), God of your fathers, God of Abraham, God of Isaac, and God of Jacob, has sent me to you; this is My Name for all time, and this is My memorial, to generation and generation."
Eve's Hebrew name is Hawah or Chawah, which means "Chavah" (to breathe) and "Hayah" (to live or give life). The traditional definition of Eve is 'Living'. As we can see, the ending is 'ah', not 'eh'. The pronunciation 'Yahweh' is not derived from the Hebrew language or the meaning of His name.
The 'weh' part of Yahweh is based on a Samaritan substitution word for His name and the writings of the 'Latin Fathers (2 groups that did not keep the way of YHWH).' In the 19th century, a linguist/historian named Wilhelm Gesenius (1786–1842) suggested 'Yahweh' as the most probable pronunciation. Most scholars and religious leaders base their pronunciation of YHWH on his work.
1) Regarding how to pronounce the initial portion of the name, he recognised that 'YaH' and 'YaHW/YaHoo' are shorter forms of YHWH that appear in many names.
2) We can examine the first portion of the name to determine how to pronounce the last part. Since the Hebrew letter 'Hey', or 'H', produces the sound "ah", we get YH = Yah, where the final 'H' is also "ah". The "oo" sound is produced by the Hebrew letter 'Waw', or 'W', 'Yah-oo-ah'. We can also refer to the Hebrew words 'Judah' or 'Yahudah'. It is composed of the same letters, YHWH-YHWDH, with the exception of the letter D. The pronunciation of Yahudah is "YaH - OO - Dah". "Yah - oo - ah" is what we get when we remove the letter D.
Yahweh is not a Hebrew name or word. Yahweh is not His name. It is an attempt to reconstruct the pronunciation of YHWH based on:
1) The testimony of people who didn’t pronounce His name and:
2) Unreliable copies of ancient texts. The scriptures themselves testify that both 'YaH' and 'WaH (oo-ah)' are shortened forms of His name. The Hebrew words 'haYaH' and 'haWaH' both mean the same thing—I AM. He told Moses, "I AM that I AM."
Our Creator's name is most certainly not Yahweh. The scriptures prove many times that His name in the third person and what we are to call Him is—YaHuWaH!
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