Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Dave Washburn <dwashbur AT nyx.net>]

On Saturday 27 September 2003 13:15, David P Donnelly wrote:
> Peter Kirk said:
>
>
> In my scholarly opinion,
> rather than belief,
> this is already happening.
>
> What is probably the original pronunciation is well known,
> and some people pray to God using that name.
>
> I don't suggest this has any  special  significance.
>
>
> Dave asks Peter Kirk:
>
> Are you allowed to make known
> "what is probably the original pronunciation" of YHWH,
> on this discussion board?

Peter can answer for himself, of course, but I would think that a look at 
most 
any scholarly or semi-scholarly work of the last 50 years would make the 
answer rather obvious...

Furthermore, pronunciation is pretty unimportant, especially wrt names.  My 
daughter's name is Naomi, and you would be amazed at how many people can't 
get it right.  But she knows who they are talking to because contextual 
factors, both linguistic and environmental, make it clear that she is the 
referent.  If a 20-year-old college student can sort that out, I suspect that 
the Almighty can as well :-)  For that matter, my last name is Washburn, but 
my father, for his entire life, pronounced it "Warshburn."  I have a friend 
named John; if he moved to Mexico he would probably be called Juan, while if 
he moved to Russia he'd be called Ivan.  Same name, varying pronunciation, no 
loss of referent.  Your comment that you have been "influenced" by the 
sacred-name movement says a lot, and I don't mind being the first to tell you 
that you have been persuaded to major on something very, very minor.  If I 
may be forgiven for waxing theological for a moment, God doesn't care what 
you call Him; all He cares is that He hears from you once in a while! ;-)

Try moving on to something important; here, that would be something related 
to 
the Hebrew language.

-- 
Dave Washburn
http://www.nyx.net/~dwashbur
"God does a lot of things in the Psalms
that He can't get away with in systematic theology."