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  • From: Gabe Eisenstein <gabe AT cascadeaccess.com>
  • To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Linguistic, historical, cultural origins of yahweh
  • Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 14:27:28 -0800

A few points about the name YHWH:

1. As I recall there are older instances of deity names Yah and Yahva from places as far away as India (Yahva in Rig Veda), Egypt (moon god Yah in papyrus of Ani) and Hatti/Syria (-yahu names in Sam'al). Therefore I think it unlikely that the name should be viewed as an original invention of "southern" or Shasu tribes. By the time that the precursor populations of the Israelite kingdoms achieved self-identification in contrast to Edomites, Philistines and Canaanites, they had chosen Yah(u or weh) in contrast to Chemosh, Baal, etc. But no one seems to know the prehistory to that.

2. Guy Zed asked whether the use of the name in the "J" sources can be used to trace its development. Here I want to say, first, that the name is also present in "E" texts, as identified by most experts, including Friedman and, I believe, Noth. What one finds in "E" texts is a very SPARING use of the name, only in a few crucial instances.
This suggests something to me that I've never seen discussed elsewhere: the possibility that the "E" writer represents the earliest case of the reticence to speak the name, which became dominant several centuries later. Martin Buber said that the name may at one time have been a war-cry. This might have been the real origin of the idea that the name can be used only on special occasions.
I also want to add that in my study of the Documentary Hypothesis I have become convinced that "E" preceded "J". (I guess 9th-8th centuries for "E" and 8th-7th for "J". Reasons available on request.)

3. Regarding the pronunciation of the name, I want to float a guess for your assessment: based on the text that derives YHWH from "ehyeh asher ehyeh", isn't it reasonable to assume a kind of rhyme between ehyeh, yihyeh and yahueh? What I mean to stress might be indicated by using an apostrophe to mark the aspiration in the middle -- so I would write yih'yeh to show that there are, so to speak, two and a half syllables there rather than two; and similarly I would write yah'ueh to show an aspiration before the u/w sound. (Maybe this is already assumed, but when I hear English speakers pronounce "yahweh" they just have two syllables, with no indication of the "u" sound or aspiration. Then it becomes puzzling as to why the contraction would be yahu.)


Gabe Eisenstein




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