do you still believe god's name is "Jehovah"?

by winnower 41 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

  • winnower
    winnower

    Sorry this is in red. I do not see a way to change it to black. This is excerpt from web page by fellow poster here at JWD. (Prodigalson)

    It just strikes me odd that many still refer to a god named Jehovah.

    If you do believe in god....do you still accept the name the watchtower gives god?

    What are your beliefs now on a "name" for god?

    If you are no longer associated with the Tower, why would you continue to recognize this jehovah god?

    If the Kabbalistic Pharisees were going to corrupt God's name,
    they would make sure that it would become something despicable!

    In the 1860 Bible Dictionary by Sir William Smith, English lexicographer, there is an entry under the word
    “moon” that has long been censored and revised:

    --"Three names of the moon were used by the Hebrews: YAREAH, paleness;
    LEBONAH, white; and HODESH (renewing) new moon" (p 206).

    Regarding the name “Yareah”:

    The first “H” after the letter “a” was dropped in the transliteration into English
    and also from more modern Hebrew translations.

    At Genesis 37:9 the word “moon” is rendered by Strong’s Concordance as “3394- Yareach”. This is a clear
    attempt to corrupt the word to conceal the connection between Yahreah the moon god and Yahweh.

    From tour egypt.net under "Yah" we read:

    Of course, the complexity and controversy of Yah stem from the term's similarity to the early form of the name
    for the modern god of the Jews (Yahweh), Christians and Muslims, as well as the fact that their ancestors
    were so intermingled with those of the Egyptians. In fact, this distinctive attribute of this god makes research on
    his ancient Egyptian mythology all the more difficult."

    Meet the moon goat-god Yah here!Thus, Yah is synonamous with the worshiped by the Muslims

    http://www.love-the-truth.net/divine_name.html

  • megaflower
    megaflower

    I no longer refer to God as Jehovah. Iam still researching but as of now my conclusion is the God of the Hebrew Scriptures is Yahweh since we do not know where the vowels go. In the Greek Scriptures The God is Jesus.

  • undercover
    undercover

    The Watchtower Society knows that it isn't correct:

    The truth is, nobody knows for sure how the name of God was originally pronounced. Why not? Well, the first language used in writing the Bible was Hebrew, and when the Hebrew language was written down, the writers wrote only consonants—not vowels. Hence, when the inspired writers wrote God's name, they naturally did the same thing and wrote only the consonants.

    While ancient Hebrew was an everyday spoken language, this presented no problem. The pronunciation of the Name was familiar to the Israelites and when they saw it in writing they supplied the vowels without thinking (just as, for an English reader, the abbreviation "Ltd." represents "Limited" and "bldg." represents "building").

    Two things happened to change this situation. First, a superstitious idea arose among the Jews that it was wrong to say the divine name out loud; so when they came to it in their Bible reading they uttered the Hebrew word 'Adho·nai' ("Sovereign Lord"). Further, as time went by, the ancient Hebrew language itself ceased to be spoken in everyday conversation, and in this way the original Hebrew pronunciation of God's name was eventually forgotten.

    In order to ensure that the pronunciation of the Hebrew language as a whole would not be lost, Jewish scholars of the second half of the first millennium C.E. invented a system of points to represent the missing vowels, and they placed these around the consonants in the Hebrew Bible. Thus, both vowels and consonants were written down, and the pronunciation as it was at that time was preserved.

    When it came to God's name, instead of putting the proper vowel signs around it, in most cases they put other vowel signs to remind the reader that he should say 'Adho·nai'. From this came the spelling Iehouah, and, eventually, Jehovah became the accepted(?) pronunciation of the divine name in English. This retains the essential elements of God's name from the Hebrew original.

    http://www.watchtower.org/e/na/index.htm

    Of course the Society is great at talking out of both sides of its mouth. They'll admit what anyone can learn about God's name from an encyclopedia but then go on to push their agenda of using Jehovah anyway.

    The name of the brochure where this was taken from is called "The Divine Name that will Endure Forever". I find this brochure title highly ironic since they admit that no one knows the true pronunciation of God's name yet declares that his name will endure forever. How is that possible, if it hasn't survived to this point even?

  • jgnat
    jgnat

    I ascribe to "I am" http://www.visionoutreach.net/iam.html

    More about the etymology of the Hebrew moon: http://www.jhom.com/topics/moon/hebrew.html

  • easyreader1970
    easyreader1970

    The reason that the Witnesses use Jehovah (in English speaking countries) is because they say this is the commonly accepted latinized version. They know that it could never have been the deity's real name--there isn't a J in Hebrew. It keeps them unified in worship. They are also aware that most of the latinized version of Biblical names are wrong, including Jesus. This keeps them from alienating people who come in from outside Christendom.

  • blondie
    blondie

    The jws did not "invent" "jehovah." It had been used for some time by many Christian religions. I went to a Lutheran church for Easter and 2 hymns used "jehovah" in reference to God. I try to avoid it because it has bad connotations because of my jw past. If you read the older WTS publications from Russell and Rutherford's pre-1931 days, "jehovah" was used but not often, not peppered in the publications like it is today, to the exclusion of Jesus Christ.

    Even Yahweh is not a sure translation. But if people prefer it, why not.

    Blondie

  • reneeisorym
    reneeisorym

    I found it interesting that a doubting dub called the Isreal branch office and asked what they called God -- They call Him Jehovah there too. The bethelite admitted that the Jews in Isreal found it upsetting because they were taught that the name for Him was Yahweh.

  • poppers
    poppers

    To me it never made sense that God would even have a name. Why would it even be necessary unless there were other gods? If he is the only god what difference would it make to have one? It's just a case of humans fashioning God into their own image. It seems to me that as soon as "God" is personalized with a name you have automatically put a limitation on that which has no limits.

  • ninja
    ninja

    check the nameplate on his house......

  • oompa
    oompa

    Just what are you getting at here winno? Are you saying Gods name is not Jehovah? Trust me it is, just check the only real authentic Bible in the world....The New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures published since 1950......I saw it there at least once......................oompa

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