On Thu, Apr 03, 2003 at 01:49:08PM -0800, Tim May wrote:On Thursday, April 3, 2003, at 01:02 PM, Harmon Seaver wrote:
On Thu, Apr 03, 2003 at 11:22:09AM -0800, Tim May wrote:
YHWH is the Tetragrammaton. Jews (and some others) believe the name of
their god may not not be spoken. Vowels are usually left out in
Semitic
languages, with sometimes placeholder consonants. In this case,
various
transcriptions of YHWH come out as "Yahweh," "Jehova," "Jehovah," etc.
Correct, except for the Jehovah part. The use of jehovah has been entirely refuted by pretty much all bible scholars and the only translation you'll find it in is, IIRC, the King James. Jehovah's Witnesses still use it, of course, but..
Nonsense. Do a Google search. It shows up in many texts, for many flavors of religion.
Many Bible texts? Care to tell us which ones? I don't really need to do much
of a google since I've got hardcopies of all the mainstream bibles sitting here
on the shelf, plus concordances. But just for instance:
American Standard Version did have it,
I said many texts. Religious scholarship is a hell of a lot more than just the several texts you cite which choose not to use this name.
Here's a small sampling:
From the Catholic Encyclopedia:
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08329a.htm "Jehovah (Yahweh)
The proper name of God in the Old Testament; hence the Jews called it the name by excellence, the great name, the only name, the glorious and terrible name, the hidden and mysterious name, the name of the substance, the proper name, and most frequently shem hammephorash , i.e. the explicit or the separated name, though the precise meaning of this last expression is a matter of discussion (cf. Buxtorf, "Lexicon", Basle, 1639, col. 2432 sqq.).
Jehovah occurs more frequently than any other Divine name. The Concordances of Furst ("Vet. Test. Concordantiae", Leipzig, 1840) and Mandelkern ("Vet. Test. Concordantiae", Leipzig, 1896) do not exactly agree as to the number of its occurrences; but in round numbers it is found in the Old Testament 6000 times, either alone or in conjunction with another Divine name. The Septuagint and the Vulgate render the name generally by "Lord" ( Kyrios, Dominus ), a translation of Adonaiusually substituted for Jehovah in reading.
And:
http://www.lamblion.net/Articles/ScottJones/jehovah.htm
"A concerted effort has been underway for the past several generations to alter the pronunciation of the Divine Name, known as the Tetragrammaton, from Jehovah into the Egyptian slur, Yahweh .In spite of these efforts, there is compelling evidence to stick with the traditional pronunciation.
Although a few elementary matters will be explained, this paper will assume that the reader has at least a basic knowledge of this issue. Therefore, those who read with a critical eye should not expect me to deal exhaustively with the technical issues, such as explaining in detail the points, the variations when the word occurs in certain combinations, its root construction, and so forth. On the other hand, the following demonstration will override most any discussions along these lines anyway, and will bring to light much that grammatical speculations and other assumptions can only prevaricate over. Thus, I will only be hitting the highlights - and generally at that - yet hopefully in such a way that even those who are not terribly familiar with this issue will still be able to keep up.
Finally, the information presented here is information that is not widely known in mainstream Christian circles, so I am confident that even those who feel comfortable with this issue will still find the data useful and enlightening. I should also mention that this treatise is intended to be primarily informational, not comprehensive, but as I said above, the following demonstrations speak volumes in and of themselves - much more, in fact, than all the grammatical and theoretical suppositions of modern biblical scholarship ever could. With that in view, let's proceed.
Briefly, the Tetragrammaton is composed of four Hebrew consonants - YHVH or YHWH (). The third letter in Hebrew is known as a vav and is pronounced by different proponents as either a Vor a W,thus the two different spellings here. For purposes of this discussion, this particular distinction is irrelevant.
When the vowel points are added to these four consonants, the word is pronounced literally as Yehovah , or the Anglicized form, Jehovah .This is the straightforward pronunciation with the vowels. It is assumed by modern scholars that the vowels have been transferred from the word Adonai (), which means Lord .This assumption has led modern scholars to believe that the vowels that are affixed to the Tetragrammaton are either not accurate or don't belong there. There is no evidence to support this assumption. In fact, the evidence goes the other way, as we shall see, for the actual evidence suggests that the vowels are accurate and that they do belong.
I have plenty of clues. I think you either need a new set of glasses or else
to put down that glass pipe if you have read *anything* at all about
Rastafarianism and don't understand that Jah is Haile Selassie. He *is* their
god. Yes, the name Yah or Jah predates them, but their use of it isn't even
remotely debatable.
Learn to read, Tim.
I said Jah was one of the variants of the name of a god. You said it was just the name of Haile Selassie, some negro dictator in Ethiopia.
Nope.
Oh, that reminds me -- another thing that the christers got wrong -- the
cross. There was none. The Romans, at least of that period, didn't "crucify"
anyone. The impaled them, essentially a stout post set into the ground with the
top end wittled to a fine point, which went up the ass of the victim. But of
course, that wouldn't look to great on the alter, would it?
The form of torture used to slowly kill the condemned was reported by many observers at the time, independent of the Jesus myth, and is documented in many places.
Search engines show hundreds of references. Here's one compendium:
http://search.metacrawler.com/texis/ search?q=Historical+Roman+Crucifixion
You're letting your mystical/Wiccan/pagan superstitious drivel interfere with scholarship.
I think I said before that I was only mildly interested in wicca.
-- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix
Yes, "CyberShaminix," your repeated references to Wicca, Druids, mystical tradition, and to the persecution of pagans and neo-pagans make me realize you are only "mildly" interested in Wicca.
You're mildly interested in Wicca and Paganism the same way Eric Raymond is.
(He was the man I found guilty of irrationalism in the First Internet Witch Trial, by the way.)
CyberShamans like you should not natter about witches and magick and then claim only "mild" interest. It's disingenuous, and you might end up in a wicker basket over a roaring fire. And that's what a _real_ "burning man" is all about.
--Tim May
