Biblical Hebrew Forum

[James Christian <jc.bhebrew AT googlemail.com>]

Hi Stephen,

I don't really feel this is about having the last word. I feel this is more
about openly discussing the lines of evidence and how we can interpret them.
I welcomely invite you and hope that you will continue to help me increase
my understanding by replying further if you feel there is anything worth
commenting on that I say as follows. Further to your last post I would like
to make the following observations:

1) You raise a very good point of the overwhelming volume of MSS without
YHWH and no MSS with. This is perhaps the most convincing argument and not
to be taken lightly by any means.

2) Personally, I am unaware of any specific MSS where KS is used in a
context which is clearly talking about Jesus. Do you know of any concrete
examples you can point me to?

3) I am very familiar with JW beliefs. I have studied their beliefs in depth
as well as a variety of Christian churches and don't feel that your claim
about what is central to their beliefs is valid or even a fair comment.

4) You interestingly raised the valid observation that we see much ado about
controversies in the early Christian literature but nothing about whether or
not the name YHWH should be pronounced. It is perhaps also worthy of note
that the earliest controversies in the Christian faith were centralised
around matters of Jewish faith such as

a) Is it necessary to get circumcised to accept the Christian faith?
b) Should sabbaths be observed?
c) Should fasts be observed?
d) Is it OK to eat pork.

Again, we see no mention of any argument about enunciation of the name. It
is a non-issue. This seems to leave us with only a few possibilities worth
considering:

i) the name hadn't been used for so long that it was considered to be a
non-issue by everybody.
ii) the issue hadn't yet been raised.
iii) it was an issue but the literature has been purged of every trace of
it.

Possibility iii) is so far fetched that none of us have even considered it.
Issue ii) is difficult to take on board because (as you rightly state) there
doesn't seem to be any explicit mention of it in the post NT Christian
literature. Possibility i) seems completely absurd because the central
prophet of Christianity, Jesus, was constantly engaged in conflicts about
the traditions of men made the word of God invalid.

In conclusion, (I'm trying to be impartial as possible here) we seem to have
a complete conundrum. None of the possibilities seems to be completely
plausible and yet all of them have arguments which can be used for or
against. I guess we will never really know for sure until God himself
announces from heaven what really happened back then.

Personally, I can sympathise with both major sides of the debate but feel
that Jesus and his apostles most likely not only knew the pronunciation of
the name but used it regularly. Half of Jesus (Yehoshua) name was half of
the name YHWH. How could he possibly have not known it?

However, in regard to the oft quoted argument where Jesus said "I have made
your name known" I am unconvinced that Jesus was talking about YHWH but was
referring to the new way of referring to God "the father" and was
highlighting how he had made God known as the father of all during his
mission.

James Christian

James Christian