Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Eduardo M. Acuna" <eacuna AT mail.giga.com>]

> Dear Friends,
> 
>   Some of the recent discussions on the Mesha Stele has raised some 
> interesting questions. I noticed that in the English translation of the
> Stele the Name of the God of Israel is pronounced (with all due respect to
> our Jewish friends) "Yahweh". I understand that we really do not know how
> exactly the Name YHWH was pronounced because of the absence of vowels in
> ancient Hebrew and we can only conjecture at its exact pronunciation.Does
> anyone know exactly how the name of Israel's God is written in the Mesha
> Stele? I assume the Moabites shared a Semitic language which would also be
> devoid of vowels? Many thanks.
> 
>                                               Tony Costa
>                                               University of Toronto
The absence of vowels is valid for the entire biblical hebrew, not only
for the name of God. It is also the same for the name of Judah: YHWDH,
which is the name of God plus a Daleth. Therefore, the most likely
pronunciation of YHWH is: Ieoua. Just by eliminating the D from Ieouda
(modern, Judah).
Eduardo.