Can We Know the Name of God?

[Music] can we really know the name of god traditional jews simply call him hashem the name for them god's name is too sacred to pronounce many english-speaking christians know him as jehovah while many biblical scholars believe his name should be pronounced yahweh so can we really know the name of god should we even try to know his name perhaps questions like this are better left untouched or maybe not after all when god revealed himself to moses he revealed his name as well he wanted his people to know him and understand him he wanted them to know that he was not like the other gods and idols like the false gods of egypt and the false gods of canaan that's not who he was and he had his own distinct name as we read in exodus 3 moses said to god when i come to the israelites and say to them the god of your fathers has sent me to you and they ask me what is his name what shall i say to them and god said to moses thus shall you say to the israelites yeah sent me to you what exactly does this mean the hebrew words can be translated i am that i am or i am who i am or i will be who i will be yeah that sounds a little mysterious then exodus 3 god tells us god said to moses tell the israelites yeah sent me to you which is like saying tell the israelites i am or i will be has sent me to you so is that the name of god is he called eh yeah i am throughout the hebrew bible actually that's not his name instead his name is spelled out more than six thousand times in the hebrew scriptures consisting of four letters y h w h in hebrew you'd hey and those letters are related to the word ehier but what does y hwh mean and how should we pronounce it and where did the name jehovah come from most hebrew scholars believe that the name jehovah arose out of a misunderstanding when christian scholars started reading the hebrew scriptures for themselves not knowing about certain jewish scribal traditions in this case because god's name was considered too sacred to pronounce jewish scribes mixed the vows for the hebrew name lord with the consonants y hwh which resulted in jehoiah or in english jehovah but when a traditional jew saw the sea understood that was not the actual name instead it was the scribe's way of saying pronounce this adonai lord that means that from everything we know the name jehovah never existed it's based on a misunderstanding of the biblical text by christian scholars centuries ago then where do we get the pronunciation yahweh scholars look at words like hallelujah which in hebrews literally praise yah a short form of yahweh we also look at names like elijah which in hebrew is eliahu my god is yahu which contains the hebrew letters y h w the first three letters of yahweh then based on other ancient semitic languages close to hebrew scholars have reconstructed the pronunciation yahweh which would mean something like he causes things to be or he who makes things happen that's saying something it also works well with the lord's word to moses i am who i am or i will be who i will be and my very name yahweh means that whatever i promise i will do can we be a hundred percent certain that this is the right pronunciation of the name can we be 100 sure that this is the real meaning of the name actually we can't one reason being that over the course of time we we lost the pronunciation of god's name because it was considered too sacred to be pronounced by the jewish community so because we can't be totally sure of how the lord's name is pronounced we can't be totally sure of what his name means but that's not such a bad thing after all we're talking about god here about the creator of the universe about the one who has no beginning and no end about a god who can sit enthroned in heaven and walk among us at the same time about a god who fills the universe with his presence and yet leads us individually by a spirit that's why paul wrote oh the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of god how unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways for who has known the mind of the lord or who has been his counselor who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid for from him and through him and to him are all things to him be glory forever amen but our god is not just transcendent he's our heavenly father and he's revealed himself to us through his son jesus yeshua so while there will always be some mystery about the lord's personal name there's no mystery about who he is and he invites us all to know him personally and intimately [Music] you

Channel: The Line of Fire

Views: 24,495

Keywords: Names of God, hebrew names of god, yahweh, jehovah, Yeshua, bible, god, adonai, names of g-d, theology, Apologetics, names of lord, old testament, Torah, Hebrew, i am that i am

Id: pqPRXBW_Q8c

Length: 5min 30sec (330 seconds)

Published: Fri Aug 07 2020