Where Does The Name Come From?

Q

What is the meaning of Yahweh or where does it come from?

A

It was against the law for the Jews to speak or write the Lord’s name except for one day each year when they spoke it 7 times in a Temple ceremony called Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement.

When they wrote His name they used 4 initials to represent it. They were translated into English as JHVH. The King James translators put LORD, all in caps, where the initials appeared in the Hebrew text. Somewhere along the way vowels from Elohim, which means God, and Adonai, which means Lord, were added to the initials forming Jehovah. Later it was determined that since in the Hebrew language the four initials are pronounced Yodh, He, Waw, and He, Yahweh is a more accurate pronunciation of God’s name.

But the truth is no one alive today knows God’s actual name. After the Temple was destroyed, the Yom Kippur ceremony changed and they no longer spoke it. Scholars estimate it was eventually lost in about 300 AD. Today Jesus is the name above all names (Phil. 2:9-11).