Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Did you know that the translators of the King James version of the Bible followed a long standing tradition of removing a very divine name from the Bible? In fact, this name appears over 6,000 times. And what's so surprising about it is they then replaced it with other names. Well, today we are going to teach you all about this name and we're going to show you how you can find it even though it isn't really there. Welcome to Jesus Christ in finding Christ on Every page. My name is Tammy Usulak hall and I am here with Dr. Donald W. Perry. And in this series we are going going to take the Old Testament, teach you some Hebrew words and talk about Jesus. So grab your scriptures and make sure you have something to mark them with and we are going to dive into this divine name. All right Don, tell us about this name. And for fun fact, it's actually more than 6,000 times Don has counted it.
[00:00:47] Speaker B: Yes, yes. So the chief objective of this episode is to demonstrate that the name Jehovah is ineffable.
[00:00:55] Speaker A: What does that mean?
[00:00:56] Speaker B: Most holy. I've got it right here, a dictionary definition. Ineffable. Too great or extreme to be expressed or described in words not to be uttered. The ineffable Hebrew name that the gentiles write as Jehovah. Now just so you know, some religious persuasions never ever say the divine name. I'll tell you what they say instead.
Now this most holy name, Jehovah, translated Lord all in caps in most English translations is prominent in the Old Testament. It is attested and awe inspiring. I am just astounded. 6,828 times.
[00:01:36] Speaker A: Okay, so stop for a second because you said that when you're reading your scriptures and right here when you see Lord in all caps. So one of the first places you can find that if you are in your scriptures go to Genesis and you just wanna go to. Is It Genesis chapter 2?
[00:01:50] Speaker B: 2:4.
[00:01:50] Speaker A: Genesis chapter 2, verse 4. There it is. Lord in all caps. Circle that. Cause we told you we're gonna find you way teach you ways to find his name even though it isn't there. And we'll tell you what the name is in a minute. But look for the Lord in all. So there it is.
[00:02:02] Speaker B: Yep. So 6,828 times. Lord, which in the Hebrew is Jehovah.
[00:02:08] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:02:08] Speaker B: Who is Jehovah? I've got three witnesses. President Russell M. Nelson. Quote Jesus is the Jehovah of the Old Testament. Next quote President Gordon B. Hinckley. Jesus was in very deed the great Jehovah of the Old Testament, number three, the living Christ, the testimony of the apostles. They say Jesus Christ was the great Jehovah of the Old Testament, the Messiah of the New.
[00:02:35] Speaker A: Okay, this is heavy for many of us because my whole growing up, God was God of the Old Testament, Jesus was alive in the New Testament. And so that, just, just take a minute and sit with this. That when you are reading about God in the Old Testament, you are reading about Jesus Christ, Jehovah. So that. But we also know that God is overall and so everything that Jesus does, God would do also and knows about. So that's kind of how I've been managed it in my brain. But when you read about Lord in the Old Testament, you're talking about Jesus Christ. He is the God of the Old Testament.
[00:03:08] Speaker B: It really is heavy. And it's so significant because if Jehovah is Jesus and there are 6,800 times, then the Old Testament is absolutely Jesus Christ focused.
[00:03:21] Speaker A: Absolutely. You can't deny that.
[00:03:22] Speaker B: Can't deny it. And we're going to look at this. I have one more quote. It's the Father and son, a doctrinal explanation position by the first parentheses and the 12. And they write Christ in his. Notice his is capital letter. I love that emphasizing Christ in his pre existent, anti mortal or unembodied state was known as Jehovah. So I've given four quotes and I.
[00:03:47] Speaker A: Like that you pointed out his is capitalized. That's important to you. And I've noticed even in my own writing, anytime I write his referring to God or Christ, I always capitalize that. And I love that you've taught me that.
[00:03:58] Speaker B: It sets it apart. Now I did something fun here. Okay, how, how can we get everyone to remember 6000? I don't care if it's 6828. 6828 times, but just 6000 times. I want all of our listeners, listeners to know that and to remember. So when they're testifying or when they're on the street or family home, evening or church, they can say Jehovah occurs in the Old Testament 6,000 times. So just for fun, I put it in different forms. One is the standard numerical form.
The next one is the word form. So spell it out. 6828. Next one is place value.
6828 equals 6 times 1000 plus 8 times 100 plus and so on.
[00:04:45] Speaker A: Okay?
[00:04:46] Speaker B: Okay. Roman numerals. And you have to have the, the, the upper line above the V and the M to make this work. So that's Roman numerals. Wow. Scientific notation. This is approximate 6.828 times 10 to the third. Okay. This is the hardest one. Binary representation, base two system. So this is what it comes out to be. Now, I got help from someone else on a couple of these. I was going to ask how in the. Yeah, amazing. I hope they're accurate, but. But it was kind of fun. But just as. Just use the top one standard numerical.
[00:05:23] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:05:23] Speaker B: People have asked, do the Restoration Scriptures use the name Jehovah or is it always Lord?
[00:05:28] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:05:29] Speaker B: So I'm going to give three examples of others. Do you mind reading the screen? Thank you.
[00:05:34] Speaker A: And now I bid unto all farewell. I soon go to rest in the paradise of God until my spirit and body shall again reunite. And I am brought forth triumphant through the air to meet you before the pleasing bar of the great Jehovah, the eternal judge of both quick and dead. Amen.
His countenance shone above the brightness of the sun, and his voice was as the sound of the rushing of great waters, even the voice of Jehovah saying, I am the first and the last. I am he who liveth. I am he who was slain. I am your advocate with the Father to the decrees of the great Jehovah.
[00:06:09] Speaker B: How.
And we're going to look at a lot of self testimonies. That's where Jehovah or Jesus bear testimony of himself. And in section 110, that one there, notice his self testimony. I am the first and the last.
I am he who liveth. I am he who is slain. I am your advocate with the Father.
[00:06:31] Speaker A: Well, and how much do we love that he's using I am, which we'll get to later. But that's the name that he gives Moses. When Moses is like, who do I tell the Israelites that sent me? And he says I am? And so there's a lot with that. So mark that in your Scriptures because we're gonna get to it and it's gonna be awesome.
[00:06:46] Speaker B: Now, what does the name Jehovah look like in ancient modern Hebrew? So I prepared this.
So this is from the great Isaiah scroll, of which I've studied a lot, officially as a Dead Sea scroll scholar.
I've worked on the actual scroll.
I just love it. This is what it looks like. You read it from right to left.
Yod. Hey. Vav. Hey. And this is very beautiful handwriting. Very professional. And this is what it looks like. The scroll dates to about 125 BC. So the name Jehovah. And then I put it in modern Hebrew. And again you read it from right to left. So that's a modern Hebrew font. And it looks a little different, especially if you take Hebrew. The two haze look a little different, but. But it all works out. There's a command form. I'll try to explain it in Hebrew. It's called a jessive form. It's a third and second person command form, but it's a little softer. And we're told to stand in awe of Jehovah and His name. Stand in awe. So let the earth fear. And that's what it looks like in Hebrew. And that's what it sounds like. Fear the Lord. So see, that's adjustive. Let the earth fear the Lord. If it's true, imperative it'd be fear the Lord, Let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe. And here I put the Hebrew and then the transliteration of him. So this is very important, and I'm going to show you, give you a story in a few minutes of someone who did fear the Lord. The second one, and I'm repeating this for emphasis. You who fear the Lord, praise Him, all you offspring of Jacob, glorify Him and stand in awe. So there it is again of him, all you offspring of Israel.
[00:08:33] Speaker A: I have a question. Can you tell us how to say those words in Hebrew?
[00:08:36] Speaker B: Yareh, Gur.
[00:08:38] Speaker A: Okay, Yare and gur. And when it says fear, what kind of. What kind of fear are we talking about? Is it like they're terrified of the Lord?
[00:08:44] Speaker B: No. Good question.
[00:08:45] Speaker A: Let's mark that. Yeah. What does it mean?
[00:08:47] Speaker B: So to have. Just be in awe of him and his majesty and his power and his glory, just have that respect. And we're going to. I'm going to give you examples in a minute of how to show utmost respect to him and his name.
[00:09:01] Speaker A: Now that changes the meaning for me when I learned that fear means respect or awe. Okay, so let's read these next three. If thou will not observe to do all the words of this law that are written in this book, that thou mayest fear the glorious and fearful name the Lord thy God, so shall they fear the name of the Lord from the west and his glory from the rising of the sun.
Teach me thy way, O Lord. I will walk in thy truth. Unite my heart to fear Thy name.
[00:09:26] Speaker B: There are other examples, but I think these five are representative. Now, I want to just set the stage.
So my class right now, right this week, the past three weeks, we've been reading Jonah, Jonah, True Story. Everyone should know that. And in chapter one, it tells about this great storm. In fact, Jonah, chapter one, calls it a mighty tempest in the sea. It says it was so mighty, the ship was like to be broken. It says the sailors threw their goods and cargo overboard to lighten the ship, which is.
Which is expensive. They just picked up cargo maybe in Yafo or Jaffa, and now they're out in the sea, and then they have to throw it over. I mean, that'd be very expensive.
[00:10:14] Speaker A: It gives a sense of desperation, like, they need help. They've got like. Yeah, you can just sense it.
[00:10:20] Speaker B: The sailors prayed to their gods, so they were not followers of Jehovah.
Yet twice, it says the sea grew more and more tempestuous. The sailors rowed hard to return back to land. They weren't successful. And it also says, it's a great tempest. So in this context, we're going to see Jonah. Jonah's down below sleeping, and the pilot of the ship goes down there and talks to him, and they figure out he's the source of the storm. So the sailors ask Jonah, what's your occupation? Now, I put these in modern, kind of.
[00:10:57] Speaker A: I like it.
[00:10:58] Speaker B: What's your occupation? Where are you from? What's your country? Who are your people? Now, Jonah responds by this. He says, I am a Hebrew.
And then he bears testimony. And I'm going to give it in the English syntax, and then in the Hebrew, he says, I'm a Hebrew and I fear. So here's the word fear. It's the same word we just looked at. I fear, meaning I'm awestruck with the Lord, with Jehovah, I fear him. It's not I'm afraid of him.
I fear the Lord, the God of Heaven. Now, this is a powerful testimony. Once you identify. See, they'd already prayed to their gods and they were not successful. So Jonah is telling. He's bearing testimony and telling who Jehovah is. He's the God of heaven. He's the one who made the sea and the dry land. And that's important for us because they're sitting there on this ship that's just in this huge storm. And for him to say, my God made this sea.
And the implication is, my God can stop this storm, and he made the dry land. And I'm going to add this. And I did this with my students.
Don't you sailors wish you were on dry land right now?
Whether it's a storm or not, just sitting on. Now notice the Hebrew order changes a little bit. Instead of saying, I fear the Lord, the God of heaven, he starts out with The Lord, the God of Heaven, I fear so he's putting the Lord first.
[00:12:29] Speaker A: I like that. Yeah.
[00:12:31] Speaker B: Now here are three statements about how we care for his name. Remember, that which cometh from above is sacred, including his name, and must be spoken with care and by constraint of the Spirit.
[00:12:43] Speaker A: Behold, I am Alpha and Omega, even Jesus Christ. Wherefore let all men beware how they take my name in their lips. For behold, verily I say that many there be who are under this condemnation who use the name of the Lord and use it in vain, having not authority, but out of a respect or reverence to the name of the Supreme Being, to avoid the too frequent repetition of his name, they. The church in ancient days called the priesthood after Melchizedek or the Melchizedek priesthood.
[00:13:10] Speaker B: And we've got a discussion coming up. We're going to profile. I hope that's the right word, Melchizedek. A profile, not profiling, but who is Melchizedek and his great power.
Now, here are some ways that I try to teach my students to honor the divine name Jehovah. For one thing I do is in class when we're reading Hebrew, I say, just pause for a little bit when you come up to the word Jehovah. So we're not treating it as every other word. So we might say like this, here's one way. And the Lord said, how about this? And the Lord said, so just kind of separating it. It works sometimes, sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes. So we don't keep repeating the word Jehovah will use pronouns in the Dead Sea Scrolls. Essenes did the same. Very interesting. And my wife and I were visiting with a brother Smith.
I remember his name and so on, his full name in the context in Salt Lake City.
And when we were there, he just paused. And out of the blue he said, he paused and he got this powerful spiritual look on his face. And he said, he lives. He really lives. And we knew he was speaking of Jesus, but he didn't say Jesus. And it would have been fine if he said Jesus lives, but he was using a pronoun. I had a Jewish instructor when I was studying at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1987, 1988, a few years ago.
And whenever we would read scripture, just any scripture, he would take out of his pocket the little kippah, the little cap, and put it on to separate what else we are talking about. Now we're reading scripture. We'd look at the Hebrew Bible and he'd say, turn here.
He'd pull that out just to separate the scripture from normal stuff.
[00:15:03] Speaker A: I have an experience, too, that has stayed with me forever. In one of the classes I was taking at a different Jewish community center my teacher was teaching. He was much younger. And one of the things that struck me is that oftentimes he would say God in conversation, not in vain, but he would use that more than I'm ever used to. And I remember staying after class to ask him, because I was thinking, don't the Jews keep the Ten Commandments? Like I asked my neighbor, do they believe in that? I mean, I thought maybe I was getting off track. So I went afterwards and I said to him, do you believe in the Ten Commandments? You know, of course we do. Like, that's the foundation of our belief system. And I said, it just seemed like you were taking the Lord's name in vain more often than I'm used to.
And he got so offended, he's like, I never did that. Not one time. And I said, well, you kept saying God so many times. And he said, that's not the name that I've been commanded not to say. And he took me to the commandments in Exodus chapter 20, and he took me to the third commandment. And the word that they're not allowed to take in vain is all caps, Lord. And that really stood out to me because I realized the name you've been teaching us and how we take it, the Jehovah name, is so sacred. And to them, when you showed us that Hebrew name, that's not how you say it in Hebrew, though. It's not Jehovah. Jehovah is a. Is it a transliteration of the Hebrew word?
[00:16:17] Speaker B: It's actually the four characters, the tetragrammaton with the vowels of Adonai. So Adonai, and then the Aleph. Under Adonai, the composite schwa disappears. So you have just the schwa. See, it's very complicated.
[00:16:33] Speaker A: No, but that's good to know, because we said that that specific word has been removed from our Bible and replaced with Lord and with Jehovah and Adonai. And that's important to know because that name is so sacred to the Jews that out of respect for them, we won't say that name on this podcast. But that's important to know that they really do take. Are careful with how they take his name in their lips.
[00:16:54] Speaker B: Yeah, And I wouldn't say it's been removed. It's still there. It's just translated. More than English.
[00:16:59] Speaker A: Yes, in the English people, just to be clear.
[00:17:01] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
[00:17:01] Speaker A: Yeah, totally correct in English. We're not going to see it translated. It will show up as Lord Adonai and those other words.
[00:17:08] Speaker B: So, as you know, I do Dead Sea Scrolls research. I've been a member of the team and I've been on a board of trustees and so on. And I wanted to show this right here.
This is from the Dead Sea Scrolls, and it's the word jehovah written with four dots. 1, 2, 3, 4. And that's found about five or six times. And what they've done is use dots instead of write out the name because the name's so sacred.
[00:17:32] Speaker A: There it is. Okay.
[00:17:33] Speaker B: Another thing they've done in some text, and I'll show you one, you read this right to left. This is Paleo Hebrew. This is from the Psalm scroll. And I've put what it's called 11Q5. I can explain that. 11Q Psalm S means cave number 11 of Qumran and so on and so forth. This is a date. But they wrote it in Old Hebrew. And it's kind of like us having a text and you're reading something on a page or in a book, and all of a sudden something's bold to set it apart, to remind them. Oh, don't say this.
[00:18:07] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:18:08] Speaker B: And I'll tell you what they say in just a minute. Well, I have it right here.
Jews consider his name to be ineffable, not to be uttered, at least ultra religious. And others. And religious Jews, and they substitute with Adonai, or they say in Hebrew Hashem, which is the name Hashem. And I'll just. So here's Psalm 118 from the dead Sea Scrolls. And you can see all of these. See, that's the name Jehovah, but it's in an older Hebrew font. Here's one here. Here's one here.
See, there are several right here. And they put it in the older font. There's one below. I missed some of them just so. And I put it in the upper right, just so those reading the text in service or at home or in the synagogue or liturgy, they won't accidentally say it. Here are some other possible divine name substitutions that they've used. Most High. Say Most High instead of Jehovah every time. This is not our faith. This is another faith. I'm not saying our faith should do this. I'm not saying that at all. I'm giving this an example of what other faiths have done.
So they don't say it too often. Foundation, goodness, fountain of knowledge, spring of holiness. Pinnacle of glory, the power of all with eternal glory.
[00:19:31] Speaker A: I mean, I know we don't, but we should. I love some of those terms. Wow.
[00:19:35] Speaker B: Yeah. And I've got some in my head that the Jewish mystics. I've studied with a Jewish scholar, Joseph Dan, who is the leading scholar of Jewish mysticism. And so I've studied what they would use too, during the Middle Ages. Now this is just something I thought I would write out. Bumper stickers you can get in Israel. I love Hashem, the name. I love the name.
Thank you, Hashem. Thank you. The name. The name meaning God, Hashem loves you. And that's in Hebrew. Hashem, Ohev, Otcha or Otech, depending if you're a boy or girl. So I wanted to see. It's even on bumper stickers now. Some people have asked, okay, Jehovah is the God of the Old Testament. Does that mean his name now is outdated? Only Old Testament. And we just use Jesus forevermore. So I've got three passages that show no, it's his name forever. Would you please read those for me?
[00:20:36] Speaker A: Absolutely.
Thy name, O Lord Jehovah, endureth forever.
Thou, O Lord Jehovah art our Father, our Redeemer. Thy name is from everlasting. Blessed be the name of the Lord Jehovah from this time forth and forevermore. And you can see it's in several different verses.
[00:20:54] Speaker B: See, it's still his name. Yeah, it's still the sacred name. Okay, I'm going to conclude by talking about Lord compound names and what those are. Those are names that have the name Jehovah built into a name. And the scholars call this. This is a 50 cent word. It's a fancy word versus a 10 cent word. It's called theophoric, which is Greek meaning bearing the name of God. And this is a loose translation. So I'll give you examples. There are about 450 of these in the Bible. 450 theophoric names, Lord and God names. Now when we look at the name Elohim, we'll look at some El names, but now we'll look at some Lord names. And I just put a note. The fact that there are scores of Lord compound names in the Old Testament I think underscores their importance and the idea that ancient Israelite parents would want to name their child with a name of God built into it. I love it.
[00:21:54] Speaker A: I do too.
[00:21:54] Speaker B: And a lot of these names we.
[00:21:56] Speaker A: Use now kind of makes me rethink the kids, my kids names. Maybe I should have worked in a.
[00:21:59] Speaker B: Yeah, one of these endings Here are some examples.
Personal names that include the name Lord. And in English, it might have a suffix, Iah Jah.
So here I underlined them. So these are all names here. That's the Lord.
Everywhere it says this. It's Jehovah. In Hebrew. In Hebrew. I have Elijah in my class right now.
All of these.
And over here, some of these you've known. Isaiah, Jeremiah, Zedekiah, Zechariah, Nehemiah, Shemariah, Uzziah. So here's what some of them mean.
We think we know what most of them means. And the scholars are not always in agreement as to what they mean. So I went with this dictionary of proper names. Just so. Isaiah, the Lord. See, every one of these have the Lord. The Lord is salvation. The Lord is my father. The Lord is my God. The Lord has shown favor. Hanan. The Lord has preserved my light. It's the Lord. Or you could say, the Lord is my light. That's Uriah. Interesting. Yeah. Uzziah. The Lord is my strength. Zechariah. The Lord remembers. Or it could be the Lord has remembered Zedekiah. The Lord is righteous and so on. Okay, I want to conclude with this.
The Lord bless thee and keep thee. The Lord make his face shine upon thee and be gracious unto thee. The Lord lift up his countenance upon thee and give thee peace.
[00:23:33] Speaker A: One of the things I did is I used a new translation and I wrote this down. So I love this prayer and this blessing because I looked up the idea where it says, make his face shine upon thee. And according to the new living translation, they've translated it as, may the Lord smile on you. And I love that translation that the Lord not only was face shine upon thee, but he will smile on you. I think a lot of us need to know that and feel that and believe it, that he really is smiling on us. And he loves us. He adores us. He is pleased with us. Are there things we should probably doing different? Maybe. But just know that his face shines upon you. He is smiling when he thinks of you and when he sees you. And I love that. I love this blessing. There's so many great things to it. So thanks for sharing that with us. Dawn. What a great discussion about that name that is in the Bible. 6,828 times. Hey, it worked. The numeric things.
[00:24:23] Speaker B: Thank you. Good. So good.
[00:24:24] Speaker A: Well, thank you so much for joining us for this discussion and we hope you enjoyed getting into your scriptures and marking things. Have fun this week as you look for all the different ways you can see Jehovah in your scriptures, this beautiful name that we need to be very careful in how we say it. And I love that. Let's remember that this week in our lessons and in our prayers as well. Have a really great week and shalom and goodbye.
