Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Uri Hurwitz <uhurwitz AT yahoo.com>]

   Rolf,
 You mentioned in passing that the Egyptians had
 already the custom of not calling a god by his
 name because of his holiness. I believe this
refers to Amun as you confirmed in an earlier
 correspondence on the subject.

   It would be interesting to speculate if this
 ancient custom, and I believe it is among the
 first attested in the ANE, had a direct influence
 on the Israeli avoidance of pronouncing
 the tetragammaton .

  This becomes all the more interesting because
judging by the surviving extra-biblical material,
 in the pre-exilic period  YHWH was 
treated as regular word. Whereas the Egyptian
 custom is much earlier.

     Uri Hurwitz                             Wilmington, VT