We sing it all the time. Hallelujah. But what does it mean? Well, first I want to do a little easy Hebrew and then some comments.
The word in Hebrew (see Ps 106:1 for example) is הללויה (without the vowel dots). Don’t let that weird you out, it is pretty straight forward and I’ll unpack it for you. First, the root of the word is הלל halel meaning “to praise or worship”. The second part of the word is ×™×” Yah is the short version of God’s name Yahweh. 1Jehovah is not and never was God’s name. Jehovah is “Yahweh” with the vowels for Adoni (Lord) transliterated through Latin. Don’t call God Jehovah, it isn’t his name. The root הלל halel is in the imperative form, it is a command. It has the suffix (don’t forget, Hebrew is right to left) of ו which is second person. Literally, it would be “you (plural) worship” and the suffix “God”. So “hallelujah” literally is “You (all) praise Yahweh!” as a command. When it is used in Psalm 106 it is directed to the people commanding them to praise God, not directly to God as a form of praise.
Have you ever sung “hallelujah” over and over again as a form of worship? There is an “updated” version of “All Creatures of Our God and King” which has a bridge inserted that simply repeats “Alleluia” over and over again. But if you consider the hymn in context, the original alleluia portion is connected to the title: all creatures of our God and King, praise God.
It is easy to repeat a word or phrase over and over and have it feel like a form of worship. Our feelings may indeed be worshipful, but let’s consider what we’re repeating.
This video got me thinking about this subject.
| ↩1 | Jehovah is not and never was God’s name. Jehovah is “Yahweh” with the vowels for Adoni (Lord) transliterated through Latin. Don’t call God Jehovah, it isn’t his name. |
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7 Comments
and I thought it was our conversation at the conference on the topic that got you thinking ;)
I’m not understanding why you have a problem with “Jehovah.” We don’t know the vowel points for YHWH. So “Yahweh” may not be correct either.
Hi Bobby. It is kind of interesting that you comment on a footnote to a post, but I’m cool with that! :)
Here’s why. Exodus 3:14 is where God announces his name. There he doesn’t say Jehovah, he says “I am who (or which) I am.” The root of Yahwah is hayah “to be” or in this case, “I am”. That gives us a hint at the correct spelling. Second, the shorthand version of it, as I mentioned in the post, is “Yah” not “Yeh”. Third, Jehovah comes to us from the Hebrew through Latin. Latin didn’t have a “y” sound so they translated it “j”. That is why we say “Jesus” rather than “Yeshua”. The Latin changed the pronunciation. Finally, in John 8:58, when Jesus says “before Abraham was, I am” the Jews try to stone him. Here we see a reaction to Jesus claiming the Holy Name for himself and we get the Greek translation of it: ego eimi that is “I AM”.
In the end we can’t be too dogmatic about how YHWH was really pronounced but all the clues hint at Yahweh rather than Jehovah.
Thanks for your quick response. As a reader, you know as well as I do that footnotes are EVERYTHING!
I’m familiar with the etymological theories for YHWH. The reason I found your footnote so strange is that you don’t seem to have a problem with “Jesus.” I, personally, use both terms and I didn’t have a problem with it as they are both transliterations and both mispronounced semitically. Thank you for your clarification.
By the way, ego eimi is another discussion. I’ve been doing some studies in John this month. Did you know that the LXX translates Exodus differently? Also, in John 9:9, the blind man uses the same phrase. The blind man kept saying, “ego eimi”.
I haven’t nailed this down yet, but these seem to be decently strong arguments against Jesus making this connection.
I just finished “The God of the Gospel of John” by Mariann Meye Thompson. It’s a wonderful read. It lends itself to this conversation.
Bobby you responded pretty quickly too! You raise some excellent questions.
So why am I not so adamant about “Jesus” or for that matter “James” or “John”? While they are transliterations and they do get changed coming through Latin, at least they are based on the right word. Since “Jehovah” is based on an error, that is reading YHWH with the vowels for Adoni, and then modified by Latin, it is a worse error.
As to Jesus’ use of ego eimi you are correct, it wasn’t simply a magic phrase. It was one way to say “I am”, although not normal. Since eimi is already a first person singular version of the verb, the pronoun ego is unnecessary. It is typically included for emphasis. So it really carries no special meaning (aside from emphasis) when the man born blind says it. Similarly, it doesn’t necessarily carry that meaning (i.e. the Divine Name) when Jesus uses it in other contexts such as in John 6:48, “I am the bread of life.”
However, the text I cited, John 8:58, has a very different use. In the context of John 8 we see Jesus ratchet up the intensity of his rhetoric with the Jews till at the end they try to stone him. At the climax of the conflict he says is “Before Abraham was (past tense), I am (present tense).” The inconsistent change in tense as well as the inclusion of the pronoun makes that phrase stand out in the Greek. But more pointedly, Jesus wasn’t speaking Greek he was speaking Aramaic. John expresses what Jesus said to us in Greek. So it seems pretty clear that Jesus used the Divine Name since the LXX translates it as ego eimi. Not only did Jesus make the connection there, the Jews did to and that is why they seek to stone him. They knew what he was claiming and reacted accordingly.
I’ve never heard of Thompson but I’ll try to take a peek and see what she has to say. The commentary I found most helpful was DA Carson’s in the Pillar Commentary series. He tends to explore the options and then land on one. Great stuff.
I think you might be a bit confused. The “j” in YHWH came from a German translation. The Vulgata doesn’t transliterate, but translates YHWH as “dominus” (lord). The vowel points from adonai where added in the 12th century, by the Masoretes.
My main concern is that Jehovah is considered a “worse error.” I heard this at church the same night I read it on your blog. I had never heard this before, and I need the clarification as to not offend brothers and sisters in the future. Is this possibly a reaction to Jehovah’s Witnesses. If so, the hesitancy is understandable.
As far as the “I AM” thing. . . LXX does not use ego eimi. It uses “ho on”. I want this to be what Jesus is saying. So why would John not use the words of the Greek bible (probably the only bible he would have had access to).
I just finished Carson’s commentary, and enjoyed it also. His understudy Kostenberger also has a fine work. I read both the commentaries together to see how they differed. Other than K’s strange count of miracles (he includes the Temple cleansing) they seem to agree.
You know Bobby, I am often confused!! According to the Merriam-Webster OnLine (I am skeptical of Wikipedia):
I really can’t see why a Biblical word should come to us through German rather than Latin. You are correct about the Masorites adding the vowel dots in the 12th century. They added all of them, not just YHWH. Minor point.
It is possible that I am reacting to the Jehovah’s Witness but regardless, it is wrong. It would be like like putting the vowels for ‘Roger’ on the name ‘Phillip’. You’d get ‘Phollep’ which is not Phillip’s name.
The LXX does indeed use ego eimi (á¼Î³á½½ εἰμι) in Exodus 3:14. Take a look here.