Category: YHWH in the Intertestamental Period

Finding Jesus in the Bible…So We Can Follow Him in Life

Bible Reading Plans

• Plan One: New Testament Only
• Plan Two: New Testament + Psalms
• Plan Three: New Testament + History
• Plan Four: The Entire Bible – Year 1 of 3, Year 2 of 3, Year 3 of 3

Don’t know which plan? Go to A Christ-Centered Bible Reading Plan: Quick Start.

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(Today’s Reading)

YHWH in the Intertestamental Period

(Essay Installment 4)

Afterword

As I commented on the “Finding Jesus in the Old Testament” angle after the conclusion of the “YHWH in the Old Testament” installments, I’m going to do the same here for the “YHWH in the Intertestamental Period” installments.

Like any God-fearing man, I fully support “reverence for the great sacredness of the divine name.” However, no God-fearing man can support suppression of the divine name from public consciousness. For one thing, why did Moses ask for the name if no one was supposed to speak it? For another, why did the prophets who wrote the Old Testament use it in their speech and in their writings – and use it far more than they used any other name? And lastly, how can “Build a fence around the Torah” be a commendable strategy?

My understanding of “Build a fence around the Torah” is that it equates to “Let’s invent a human commandment that will make it impossible for us to break a divine commandment.” This is absurd. Do we think we’re smarter than God? Can we write better commandments than He does? It’s what Paul would call self-made religion.

Colossians 2:23 These are matters which have, to be sure, the appearance of wisdom in self-made religion and self-abasement and severe treatment of the body, but are of no value against fleshly indulgence.

Inventing a commandment that will keep us from disobeying God’s commandment is not only a flawed concept; it also can be shown to break down in this specific case. Here is the divine commandment in question:

Exodus 20:7 “You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not leave him unpunished who takes His name in vain.

There’s no basis in the text for narrowing its focus to words said out loud. The commandment’s natural meaning would include the way that Israel and its citizens lived – not just vocalizing the name. For example, Israel should not accept its role as YHWH’s nation but then live in such a way that would bring dishonor to His name. A name is not just an identifier, it’s a reputation. To think that not pronouncing the Lord’s name fulfills the commandment’s purpose is ludicrous. I could say much more about the weakness of the “Build a fence” strategy, but I won’t belabor the obvious. Censoring the name of YHWH was neither necessary nor helpful.

You might now ask, “If suppressing the use of YHWH was not good, why didn’t Jesus correct it?” The answer is that God is known for using even the foolishness of men to achieve His purposes (Acts 2:23-24). By substituting “Lord” for “YHWH,” Jews were substituting a title for a personal name. This, in effect, made the title into a personal name. That “Lord” would now be able to function both as a title and as a personal name made it perfectly suited for Jesus and His mission. This will become clearer when we get to “YHWH in the New Testament,” but I should give some explanation here and now.

The New Testament authors quoted Old Testament descriptions of YHWH that clearly applied to Jesus. For example, notice how the apostle John references what the prophet Zechariah quoted as an utterance of YHWH’s when describing Jesus’ crucifixion.

John 19:37 And again another Scripture says, “THEY SHALL LOOK ON HIM WHOM THEY PIERCED.”

Zechariah 12:10 “I will pour out on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit of grace and of supplication, so that they will look on Me whom they have pierced; and they will mourn for Him, as one mourns for an only son, and they will weep bitterly over Him like the bitter weeping over a firstborn.

If you read it in context, you’ll see that Zechariah is quoting YHWH as saying, “they will look on Me whom they have pierced.” (That’s why “Me” is capitalized by the translators.) There are many such New Testament quotations or allusions to Old Testament YHWH texts finding their fulfillment or meaning in Jesus. Likewise, there would have been many such references in the preaching of the apostles. When Greek-speaking Jews heard “Kurios” associated with Jesus, they would have thought “YHWH.” But when Greek-speaking Gentiles heard “Kurios” associated with Jesus, they would have thought “chief authority figure). Thus both Jews and Greeks (Gentiles) heard a word that had ready and relevant meaning to them, but the precise meaning each heard was different. By contrast, if YHWH had been transliterated or even translated in the Septuagint or in preaching, it’s likely the Greeks would’ve been sidetracked by a word whose meaning was unknown to them.

In the manner described, God has brought forth good even from our evil (Gen 50:20; Neh 13:1-2; Rom 8:28). That said, over the centuries since, Gentiles have lost sight of that linguistic connection between YHWH and KURIOS and LORD. Therefore, they have lost the connection that would tell them that Jesus was YHWH. And Jews are certainly not going to remind Gentiles of this connection.

Summing up, the suppression of the name YHWH allowed a title (Lord) to serve as a proper name. This was a benefit to 1st-century folks, but a handicap to 21st-century folks. Nevertheless, we can overcome the handicap. We just have to study the words in their original languages and contexts…as we are doing. And our doing this is what makes the study of YHWH a way of “finding Jesus in the Old Testament” (FJOT).

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Finding Jesus in the Bible…So We Can Follow Him in Life

Bible Reading Plans

• Plan One: New Testament Only
• Plan Two: New Testament + Psalms
• Plan Three: New Testament + History
• Plan Four: The Entire Bible – Year 1 of 3, Year 2 of 3, Year 3 of 3

Don’t know which plan? Go to A Christ-Centered Bible Reading Plan: Quick Start.

Extras

Verse of the Day, Audio Capsule, and Video Minute

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(Today’s Reading)

YHWH in the Intertestamental Period

(Essay Installment 3)

Conclusion

The combined effect of the two intertestamental social trends I’ve described was swift, profound, and lasting. To this day, Jews will not say the name YHWH aloud, using substitute words instead. And to this day, translations of the Hebrew Scriptures around the world do not attempt to translate YHWH, using substitute words instead. And that’s why we see in our English Bibles today the all caps “LORD” sprinkled from one end of the Old Testament to the other. Even in the NASB 1995, we are not seeing the word “YHWH” being translated like all the other words; rather, we are following the Jewish practice, developed during the period between the testaments, of substituting a title for a personal name. (But for those who knew back then, and those who know today, it was a case of a title becoming a personal name. That is, “the Lord” became a way of referring exclusively to YHWH, as long as the context didn’t indicate “lord” was referring to some other kind of lord.)

Viewed together, the two trends of vocalization and translation become one trend of removing the name YHWH from public consciousness…all over the world. But the full effect was not immediate. When temple and synagogue readers first started substituting Adonai (Lord) for YHWH, everyone listening remembered what name was being replaced. Even Greek-speaking Jews knew, whether from personal memory or from the context of the passage being read, what name was being replaced. (And thus did the title “LORD” become a personal name of “YHWH” for those who knew, much like “Rock” (Peter) became a personal name for Andrew’s brother Simon.)

By New Testament times (1st century AD), the Romans had conquered the Greek world. Nevertheless, Greek remained the dominant language in that century. It was therefore natural for the New Testament authors, who themselves wrote in Greek, to quote more often from the Septuagint rather than from the Hebrew texts when citing an Old Testament passage. Since Jesus apparently gave His apostles no instructions to focus on the issue, the earliest Christians used the Septuagint without reservation – even more than they used the Hebrew texts. That made perfect sense, given the worldwide focus of the gospel.

Since the very earliest Christians were almost all Jews, they, too, retained knowledge of the divine name that was not showing up in their texts. But over time, as Christianity accepted more and more Gentiles into the faith, there came a point when Jewish memories became a small factor. Increasingly, the Christian population did not think “YHWH” when they read or heard “Lord.” This has had enormous implications for post-1st century Christian interpretation of the Bible.

Rabbinic Judaism looked back on the intertestamental period as a time when Jews “rightly” sought to “build a fence around the Torah” even though Intertestamental Jews might not have used those exact words. But the decision to suppress expression of YHWH became ingrained in Jewish religious thought along these lines. Even the NASB 1995 says of YHWH in its preface, “This name has not been pronounced by the Jews because of reverence for the great sacredness of the divine name.” But you have now seen that this sentiment took root in the Intertestamental period – not during the Old Testament age. Are we to suppose that the prophets who spoke and wrote the name YHWH far more than they spoke and wrote any other name were being irreverent toward it?

We will have to answer that question for ourselves…for the reason I gave at the beginning of this focus on the Intertestamental period:

Because there was no prophet to record the history of YHWH and Israel for the 400-500 years between the last writings of the Old Testament and first writings of the New Testament, we have to rely on other historical sources for that period. These other historical sources are sufficient to tell us what happened; we just won’t have the prophets to tell us what YHWH thought about those happenings.

I’ll dwell on this tomorrow.

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Finding Jesus in the Bible…So We Can Follow Him in Life

Bible Reading Plans

• Plan One: New Testament Only
• Plan Two: New Testament + Psalms
• Plan Three: New Testament + History
• Plan Four: The Entire Bible – Year 1 of 3, Year 2 of 3, Year 3 of 3

Don’t know which plan? Go to A Christ-Centered Bible Reading Plan: Quick Start.

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(Today’s Reading)

YHWH in the Intertestamental Period

(Essay Installment 2)

Writing the Name YHWH

This second intertestamental development initially had nothing to do with the de-vocalization of YHWH, but it was inevitable that the two developments would intersect. Let me explain the historical background and the need for a written translation of the Old Testament from Hebrew into Greek. Then we’ll see how the de-vocalization of YHWH affected the translation of YHWH.

When Israel’s northern kingdom was conquered by the Assyrians in the 8th century BC, and its southern kingdom was conquered by the Babylonians in the 6th century BC, many Jews were displaced from Israel and scattered throughout the surrounding world – what they call their dispersion, their “Diaspora.” In the 5th century BC, the Old Testament age quietly ended. During the 4th century BC, Alexander the Great conquered the eastern Mediterranean nations and, as a result, Greek soon became the dominant language of countries in that part of the world. By the 3rd century BC, many Diaspora Jews no longer spoke Hebrew fluently. This established the need for a Greek translation of the Jewish Scriptures (the Old Testament).

The project to get the Old Testament translated from the original Hebrew into Greek began with the five books of Moses: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. This translation was called the Septuagint because it was believed to have been produced by about 70 Jewish scholars. (“Septuagint” comes from the Latin word “septuaginta” which means seventy; for this same reason, you’ll see Septuagint abbreviated as “LXX” – the Roman numerals meaning 70.)

The rest of the Septuagint was translated in stages: the historical books in the 3rd-2nd centuries BC, the Psalms and other wisdom literature in the 2nd century BC, and the Prophets in the late 2nd to early 1st century BC. Obviously, multiple translators were involved over multiple generations.

It is at this point in time that our two intertestamental developments (re: speaking YHWH and re: writing YHWH) intersect. That is, in the time of the Septuagint’s formation, it was increasingly standard practice for temple and synagogue readers to vocalize “Adonai” when YHWH was encountered in the Hebrew. What were the LXX translators to do? Some of the earliest manuscripts from that period indicate that they initially just printed YHWH. Then, apparently, concern that some reader in a far-flung country might accidentally utter the sacred name nudged the translators to employ a different strategy. They would translate YHWH as the Greek word “kurios” (lord) which was the Greek equivalent of the Hebrew word “adonai” (lord). This insured that there would be no vocalization of YHWH…just as the Jewish temple reading protocol required.

It’s important for us to recognize that the LXX translators did not want to innovate. Like any responsible translators, their goal was to accurately transfer meaning from one language to another. However, responsibility also meant respecting the context in which that meaning was being delivered. Literacy rates were low in ancient times – usually 5-10% of the population. Almost all reading was public reading – that is, out loud. Even literate people digested most of their reading material through public readers. This was all the more true with Jews and their Scriptures, given that that these texts were written on scrolls and therefore both expensive and inconvenient. (The ancients would faint if they knew individuals would one day walk around with all of that content – and more – in a handheld smartphone.) Thus, for the LXX translators, the most important aspect of translating YHWH was to preserve the reading tradition practiced by the priests and other readers in the synagogues wherever in the world they were. And the tradition that had become sacrosanct during the intertestamental period, as covered in the previous section, was that YHWH was not to be spoken. Therefore, the LXX translators, not wanting to be accused of dereliction of duty, removed any possibility of complicity in that infraction by consistently translating YHWH as KURIOS.

Thus, in the wake of gradually suppressing all vocalization of YHWH in Hebrew-speaking contexts, Jews eventually suppressed its expression in both vocal and written forms in the rest of the world through the Septuagint. Meanwhile the Hebrew text would continue to show YHWH even though it was always vocalized as Adonai. Nevertheless, because Christianity was embraced by Gentiles as well as Jews, there were soon way more Gentiles than Jews using the Old Testament. Since Gentiles were almost always using translations of the Old Testament rather than in Hebrew, the knowledge of the precise Hebrew name YHWH shrank even more. Increasingly, the world would recognize the name “YHWH” only as “LORD.”

Finding Jesus in the Bible…So We Can Follow Him in Life

Bible Reading Plans

• Plan One: New Testament Only
• Plan Two: New Testament + Psalms
• Plan Three: New Testament + History
• Plan Four: The Entire Bible – Year 1 of 3, Year 2 of 3, Year 3 of 3

Don’t know which plan? Go to A Christ-Centered Bible Reading Plan: Quick Start.

Extras

Verse of the Day, Audio Capsule, and Video Minute

Overflow

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(Today’s Reading)

YHWH in the Intertestamental Period

(Essay Installment 1)

In Between the Two Testaments

Because there was no prophet to record the history of YHWH and Israel for the 400-500 years between the last writings of the Old Testament and first writings of the New Testament, we have to rely on other historical sources for that period. These other historical sources are sufficient to tell us what happened; we just won’t have the prophets to tell us what YHWH thought about those happenings. Still, that intertestamental history is important to us. And there are two specific developments that occurred during this period which have had a profound and dramatic effect on how the name YHWH is spoken and written…even to this day.

Speaking the Name YHWH

Since YHWH is, by far, the most frequently occurring content word in the Old Testament, it would have been for that very reason, by far, the most frequently vocalized content word in the Old Testament. And this was true right up to the period between the testaments. But by the end of that interim period of roughly four to five centuries, it was hardly ever spoken aloud by anyone. This change in Jewish behavior is really quite stunning.

This development is all the more stunning when you consider that there was no official edict that launched or demanded the change, nor any governing authority to police its enforcement. It was one of those social trends that seems to start out of nowhere, build up steam, quickly becoming a societal fixture – a change that becomes resistant to any further change.

The trend appears to have begun in earnest after the devastation of Israel’s loss to Nebuchadnezzar in 586 BC. It’s understandable that the destruction of the temple and the Babylonian captivity would cause a national soul searching for Israel. The nation’s demise had been as awful as YHWH had said it would be if they were unfaithful to the covenant. Therefore, the nation taking on a greater concern for the commandments Moses had laid down would be understandable – especially this one:

Ex 20:7 “You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not leave him unpunished who takes His name in vain.

Notice that the warning is about the name of “YHWH your God.” So some people began thinking, “If we can avoid saying His name altogether, then we can avoid even the possibility of breaking this commandment.” For this and other reasons, readers at the temple and in the synagogues began substituting the Hebrew word “Adonai” (“My Lord” or “My Master”) whenever they came to YHWH in a line of text. Less frequently, they would use “Ha Shem” (Hebrew for “the Name”) as the substitute for YHWH. The point was to protect the sacred name by substituting a title or epithet in its place (most often “Adonai”) so that you wouldn’t have to speak it.

This trend of substitution continued over the centuries immediately after Old Testament history ended such that, by the time the New Testament era begins, YHWH was only being spoken in the temple, only by a priest, and only on the holiest day of the Jewish year. Therefore, after 70 AD when the Romans destroyed the temple and gave the Jews no chance to rebuild it, the name YHWH was not being spoken at all by any Jew. Again it deserves to be said, this is a stunning thing – the most frequently spoken word in the Old Testament becomes its least frequently spoken word during the years between the testaments.

But what’s even more stunning is that this is only half the story. The other half describes how the most frequently written content word in the Old Testament became the least frequently written content word in translations of the Old Testament! I’ll tell you about that half of the story tomorrow.

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