The name of Jesus, and a novel about the Knights Templars
On Thursday, April 3, 2003, at 10:05 AM, Harmon Seaver wrote:
On Thu, Apr 03, 2003 at 10:12:53AM -0600, Kevin S. Van Horn wrote:
Harmon Seaver wrote:
Translate/transliterate is irrelevant -- you don't change people's
names,
Ever hear of King Ferdinand of Spain? His real name was, of course,
Fernando -- Ferdinand is merely the English equivalent. Likewise,
English and Spanish speakers use different names for the same explorer
-- Christopher Columbus vs. Cristobal Colon.
Yes, the americans and brits are infamous for their total
ignorance and
disregard for the sensetivities of others. It's called the Ugly
American/Ugly
Brit syndrome. And it's part and parcel of why the rest of the world
hates us.
It's a wonder they haven't changed the name of the Prophet
Mohammed to Mumbo
or something equally inane. And Allah to asshole.
And then of course there were those moron christer monks who in
the 13th
century decided to create a new name for god himself, and stuck
Jehovah into
the text.
Even I, as a nonbeliever in anthing religious, know that much of your
theology is wrong.
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.
The Yah part is familiat to those familiar with Rastafarians, as Ja
or Jah.
As for silly claim that no Jewish mother ever named her son Jesus,
Ken Brown and others have already dealt with how languages and
alphabets shift around. The shifts between consonants (like J and Y,
like D and T in German, and so on) are well known to all etymologists.
Here's a short description from the American Heritage Dictionary (my
favorite dictionary). Some of the diacriticals may not have survived my
cutting and pasting, but the gist is clear:
ETYMOLOGY:
Middle English, from Late Latin Isus, from Greek Isous, from Hebrew
y{, from yht{a, Joshua. See Joshua1.
What you may have been thinking of is No Jewish mother ever named her
son Christ. Christ is, of course, essentially a title, not a name.
But Jesus is a perfectly legitimate name (even if Jesus wasn't).
By the way, a fun novel with crypto scattered throughout it is the new
novel The Da Vinci Code, by Dan Brown. It just came out and I've been
reading it this week. The plot is that a leading symbologist (who was
also in Brown's earlier novel, Angels and Demons) is a suspect in a
murder in the Louvre. He and his cryptologist woman friend (shades of
Hollywood--necessary so that Angelina Jolie or Jennifer Garner can play
the ass-kicking cryptologist babe) find cryptic messages written by her
murdered grandfather. Uncovering the clues related to the Priory of
Sion, the Knights Templars, the Holy Grail, and the blood line of Jesus
take the reader through France, Italy, and England.
(The core of the research is pretty obvious Baigent, Leigh, and
Lincoln's Holy Blood, Holy Grail, from 20 years ago, and the names
are even used in anagram form in the novel. The Templars make for an
interesting storyHarmon will probably try to weave in some
connection with his Druids and how sweet old ladies were murdered as
Wiccans. Indeed, many Templars were liquidated in a purge, on a Friday
the 13th, no less. There is almost certainly some major history going
on that is not taught popularly.)
--Tim May
Extremism in the pursuit of liberty is no vice.--Barry Goldwater
RE: The name of Jesus, and a novel about the Knights Templars
By the way, a fun novel with crypto scattered throughout it is the new novel The Da Vinci Code, by Dan Brown. It just came out and [...] murdered grandfather. Uncovering the clues related to the Priory of Sion, the Knights Templars, the Holy Grail, and the blood line of Jesus take the reader through France, Italy, and England. Sounds a lot like Umberto Eco's Foucault's Pendulum. I found that a really fun read. The main plot is based on a centuries old conspiracy by templars and the like, and the YHWH based reordering of the name of God is central to part of the book. Looks like someone's trying to get money easily :) Unless it's the same book and the publisher decided it would sell better with an anglo saxon name on it ? :) -- Vincent Penquerc'h
Re: The name of Jesus, and a novel about the Knights Templars
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, however, the New American Standard doesn't. King James had it in 4 verses, but none in the New King James. New International Version doesn't have it. The NIV is the favorite of most fundys. Revised Standard Version doesn't have it, nor does the New Revised Standard. The RSV is considered by almost any biblical scholar to be the hands-down best translation. Douay-Rheims doesn't. New American Bible, mostly used by Catholics, doesn't Hebrew Names Version of World English Bible doesn't have it. There are a couple fo the more recent colloquial translations that have it, but those aren't well thought of by *any* scholars. In short, there are almost no bible translations at all that use the name jehovah. The theory that the vowels were some of the ones in the Greek name for Lord is just one of several theories. Inasmuch as there are several main vowel sounds, nearly any attempt to speak YHWH out loud is going to lead to some sound that is a variant of Yah-way or Ya-ho-way or Ya-ho-vah, given the usual Y/J and V/W and suchlike shifts. The Yah part is familiat to those familiar with Rastafarians, as Ja or Jah. Well, sort of -- but actually for them Jah is just the shortened version of Jah Ras Tafari, meaning Haile Selassie, Emperor of Ethopia, direct descendant of the King David. Again, nonsense. I said Jah is another variant of the name of their god, and this is exactly what Jah Ras Tafari contains. And the word Jah pre-dated that Ethiopian politician by thousands of years. To claim that the Jah in a name applied mid-20th century is part of the shortened version of Jah Ras Tafari is silly. Get a clue, Harmon. 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. None of the variant spellings of Jesus had _anything_ to do with the name of the god (in terms of the jewish thing you cite). The Jews did not confuse Joshua/Yeshua/Iosus/Jesus/whatever with their desert vengeance god YHWH. Neither should you. The mainstream Jews of course did not, however, the jewish followers of him most certainly did, and he very clearly said that he and YHWH were one and the same. Or at least so we read in the New Testament. Again, learn to read, Tim, this is another point that isn't at all debatable. See John 10:30 The Father and I are one. but that's not the only place. And just that alone was enough to get him killed. 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? 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 http://www.cybershamanix.com
