Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Herman Meester" <crazymulgogi AT gmail.com>]

Dear Baruj,

There is no such basis; Jesus' original name was neither Yehoshua or
Yahoshua, it was just Yeshu. Unlike Christians nowadays, Jews in
Antiquity didn't have "official" names, as far as I think is known at
least, so even if we claim that the "original version" of "Yeshu" had
been "Yehoshua", this would have been irrelevant to the Galilean
family he was born in.
By the way, both /h/ and /`/ (`ayin) were likely not to have been
pronounced in Galilee anymore, as the sources suggest, and the name
Yehoshua (as a biblical name) was probably pronounced, if people would
discuss a "biblical" subject, simply "Yeshu" too.

Writing this, I suddenly worry I misinterpret your question; maybe
you'd mean to ask if the name that "Yeshu" ultimately derives of would
have been pronounced "Yahoshua" instead of "Yehoshua"?
In the latter case, that is likely, because instead of shwa, the
biblical authors likely did pronounce /a/ in this case. However, then
they would have pronounced Yahoshu` (or Yahushu`) and not Yahoshua;
for the `ayin was not replaced with /a/ yet for Scripture recitation
(as the Masoretes resolved their inability to pronounce the
gutturals).

best regards,
Herman Meester,
Rotterdam, Netherlands


2006/4/4, Baruj Diez <barujdiez AT yahoo.es>:
> Dear friends,
>
>    I  would  like  to know if there is a sound basis to
> claim that Jesus's original name was "Yahoshua" instead
> of   "Yehoshua."  I  would  appreciate  very  much  any
> comment.
>
>    Best wishes,
>
> --
>    Baruj Diez
>      Asturias, España
>
>
>
> ______________________________________________
> LLama Gratis a cualquier PC del Mundo.
> Llamadas a fijos y móviles desde 1 céntimo por minuto.
> http://es.voice.yahoo.com
> _______________________________________________
> b-hebrew mailing list
> b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
> http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/b-hebrew
>