The Divine Name

This page answers the question: "Did the Watchtower restore God's divine name?"

Watchtower leaders knew, as early as the 1940's by the new information generated from the Dead Sea Scrolls, that Jehovah was never God's divine name in any language. It is not found is any Hebrew or Greek Manuscript. It was first used in the 13^th century as a substitute for the divine name by a Spanish Catholic Monk. (See WT publication, The Divine Name That Will Endure Forever, p.17) Raymundus Martini mixed the vowels of Adonai and Elohim with the consonants of the Tetragram to form the name "Jehovah." So in reality one substitute has no greater significance than any other substitute, for a substitute is a substitute. Since the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, Bible Scholars have use the name Yahweh. It is believed by both Jews and Christians to be the closest rendering of the divine name. Watchtower leaders simply did not want to give-up the name "Jehovah" because it had become in 1931 a symbol for their movement known as "Jehovah's Witnesses."

REFERENCE WORKS THAT DOCUMENT THIS FACT

JEHOVAH-- A term invented, or at least first used, by a Spanish Monk, Raymundus Martini. "In 1278 it appeared in Latin in the work Pugeo Fidei (Dagger of Faith), by Raymundus Martini, a Spanish monk." He took the vowels from ELOHIM and ADONAI and mixed them with the Tetragrammaton to form a translatable name for YHWH. Reference is made in part to: The Watch Tower Bible And Tract Society, The Divine Name..., 1984,p. 17.

JEHOVAH --"is an erroneous form of The name of the God of Israel." ENCYCLOPEDIA AMERICANA

JEHOVAH -- "the pronunciation "Jehovah" is an error resulting among Christians from combining the consonants YHWH with the vowels of Adonai or Elohim." ENCYCLOPEDIA BRITANNICA

JEHOVAH --"false form of the divine name YAHWEH." NEW CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA

JEHOVAH --"is a mispronunciation of the Hebrew YHWH the name of God. This pronunciation is grammatically impossible. The form "Jehovah" is a philological impossibility." THE JEWISH ENCYCLOPEDIA (p. 160)

YHWH --"When Christian scholars of Europe first began to study Hebrew, they did not understand what this really meant, and they introduced the hybrid name "Jehovah"...THE TRUE PRONUNCIATION OF THE NAME YHWH WAS NEVER LOST. Several early Greek writers of the Christian church testify that the name was pronounced 'YAHWEH". This is confirmed, at least for the vowel of the first syllable of the name, by the shorter form Yah, which is sometimes used in poetry (e.g. Ex. 15:2) ... The personal name of God of Israel is written in the Hebrew Bible with the four consonants YHWH and is referred to as the "Tetragrammaton." At least until the destruction of the First Temple in 586 B.C.E. this name was regularly pronounced with its proper vowels, as is clear from the Lachish Letters, written shortly before that date." ENCYCLOPEDIA JUDAICA (Jerusalem) p. 680 Vol. 7