Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Rolf Furuli <furuli AT online.no>]

Dear Stephen,

When we discuss translation, we need to apply the 
rules of translation. The rule which relates to 
the rendering of YHWH in English translation, is 
that a proper name in Hebrew which refers to a 
particular person or place should be transcribed 
into English in accordance with the stock of 
phonemes of English and not substituted with 
anothr word. The only situation where translators 
can consider deviating from this, is where there 
is a play of words in connection with the name, 
and this is more important that the reference. 
Tthis is not the case with  YHWH, so to 
substitute this name with "the Lord" is a blatant 
violation of a fundamental rule of translation.

I have recently completed a study of the use of 
divine names in *all* the Dead Sea Scrolls, both 
in biblical and- non-biblical manuscripts. The 
substitute for YHWH that was used at Qumran was 
)EL and not )DNY. The word )DNY  was used in the 
non-biblical scrolls 71 times while )EL occurs 
667 times. Only in  one or two instances *may* 
)DNY be used as a substitute for YHWH. But this 
is absolutely not certain, because in the 
biblical manuscripts we sometimes find YHWH where 
MT has )DNY and we find )DNY where the MT has 
YHWH.  There is absolutely no clear evidence that 
YHWH was substituted by )DONY in writing or in 
pronunciation in the 1st and 2nd century B.C.E., 
or even in the 1st century C.E.

On the basis of this there is an acute problem 
regarding KURIOS in the NT. If )DNY (=KURIOS) was 
not used as a substitute for YHWH when Jesus was 
on earth, then it must have been the NT writers 
who invented the use of KURIOS instead of YHWH. 
And why should they, when the Tanakh several 
places (e.g. Exodus 3:15) says that YHWH should 
be used as a reference to God for ever. And, when 
Jesus in the synagogue in Nazareth  according to 
Luke 4:17, 18 read from the prophet Isaiah where 
YHWH is found, why should he substitute the 
proper name of God with something else? Even if 
this was the custom, for which there is no clear 
evidence, why should he, who condemned the 
commandments made by men that violated the law, 
follow such a superstitious custom?

The writers of the NT often quoted from the LXX, 
and interestingly the few fragments of the LXX 
that we have from the 2nd and 1st centuries 
B.C.E. and the 1st century C.E. all contain the 
name in some form- either in archaic Hebrew or 
Aramaic script or as the Greek phonetic 
transcription IAO.  So no KURIOS in this version 
either.

Then we come to a very interesting point.  In the 
UBS and other Greek texts of the NT we never find 
YHWH but only KURIOS. However, we do not have the 
autographs of the NT manuscripts, and there is 
strong evidence that , as far as the writing of 
God´s name is concerned, the NT text was tampered 
with between 75 and 125 C.E. How so? As already 
mentioned, the text of the LXX, as late as the 
1st century C.E. contains YHWH and not the 
substitute KURIOS. But in the oldest C.E. LXX 
manuscripts that we have (from the middle of the 
2nd century C.E. or a little later) we find the 
substitute KS (or, a few times QS) with a 
horizontal bar above where YHWH previously was 
written. This shows that the LXX text was 
tampered with in the period I have mentioned, and 
the name of God was substituted by something 
else. In the oldest NT manuscrips from the same 
period ( the middle of the 2nd century ) we also 
fin KS in quotes from the OT (and in other 
instances) where YHWH is found in Hebrew. The 
same tampering pattern is evident both regarding 
the LXX and the NT, And it is obvious that KS, QS 
and several other nomina sacra were not found in 
the NT autographs. Thus, the NT text has been 
tampered with as well!  And because the LXX 
originally had YHWH and this was changed to KS, 
it can be argued that the substitution KS in the 
NT also is a substitution of YHWH. When we also 
keep in mind that there is no evidence that YHWH 
was substituted by )DNY among the people in the 
days of Jesus, a good case can be made for YHWH 
being found in the NT autographs, at least in the 
quotes from the OT.

A discussion of this is found in the article 
"Divine names" in "The Anchor Bible Dictionary." 
A different view can be found in M. Rösel. The 
Reading and Translation of the Divine Name in the 
Masoretic Tradition and the Greek Pentateuch." 
JSOT 31, 2007: 411-428. For those who Read 
German, I refer to  M. Rösel's doctoral 
dissertation: "Warum Gott "Herr" genannt wird?" 
2000. Tübingen.  The intersting thing here are 
the great problems he has to find evidence for 
his main theory, that YHWH was substituted by 
another word.


Best regards,

Rolf Furuli
University of Oslo


> Hi James,
>
> Just a little note: From a Christian point of view, I have always found it
> interesting that the NT writers never felt obliged to transcribe or
> translate YHWH when quoting from or alluding to the Tanakh. If kurios was
> good enough for them, then Lord/LORD is good enough for me.
>
> Stephen Shead
> Sydney, Australia
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