Biblical Hebrew Forum

[K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

Dave & Garth:

I just went to your site, and notice that someone in the discussion section
indicated how the theophoric names could have been derived from יהוה in one
step, or two steps—just take off the final -H and stick it on the front.

I am not impressed with Gesenius as far as his dictionary is concerned,
therefore see no reason to follow his proposed pronunciation of יהוה either.

I have stated repeatedly on this list that I think that Hebrew pronunciation
was corrupted by Aramaic speaking Jews already starting by about 400 BC, the
corruption would have been well along by 300 BC, so by the time of the LXX
the pronunciations would have been significantly different from Biblical era
pronunciations.

This is a conclusion, not a presupposition.

Further, I have seen a few scattered clues, and I think that’s about all
there are, that the pronunciation in other areas, Galilee for example, was
different from the Alexandrian pronunciation preserved in the LXX.


> And then we have Clement of Alexandria writing that the Tetragrammaton
> was called "Iaoue" in about 190 A.D.
>

You have to take this with a grain of salt, a big grain of salt, seeing as
the Greek did not have the H, W and Y consonants. Depending on how those are
distributed in the name, one could get YiHaWouHe (the capitals are the
Hebrew consonants, the small letters the Greek vowels) as the pronunciation.
Or you could try a few other variations. But one that seems very unlikely to
me from this transliteration is “Yahweh” as I recognize at least three
syllables in it.

>
> Dave Donnelly
>
>
> Karl W. Randolph.