Just some interesting reading
Hebrew Names of God in the Bible
In our modern culture a title defines the position, or character, of an individual while a name is nothing but an identifier with no meaning. In Hebrew all names are words with meaning and represent the character of the individual. Using English as an example my name, from an Hebraic perspective, could be Jeff, father, husband, son or manager. The first column is the name in Hebrew, the second is an English transliteration, the third is its literal translation and the fourth is a Biblical reference with the name.
אל El mighty one Genesis 14:19
אלוה Elo'ah power Deuteronomy 32:15
אלהים Elohiym powers Genesis 1:1
יהוה Yehu he exists Genesis 4:1
אהוה Ehyeh I exist Exodus 3:14
אדוני Adonai lords Genesis 18:27
אחד Ehhad one Zechariah 14:9
מלך Melekh king Psalm 47:6
אב Av father Isaiah 64:8
מושיע Moshi'ah deliverer Isaiah 45:15
רוח Ru'ahh wind Genesis 1:2
בורא Borey filler Isaiah 40:28
באל Ba'al master Isaiah 54:5
עושה Oseh maker Isaiah 54:5
אל שדי El Shaddai mighty breasts Genesis 17:1
אדוני יהוה Adonai Yehu Adonai of Yehu Genesis 15:2
יהוה אלהים Yehu Elohiym Yehu of Elohiym Genesis 2:4
יהוה יראה Yehu Yireh Yehu sees Genesis 22:14
יהוה נסי Yehu Nisi Yehu is my standard Exodus 17:15
יהוה שלום Yehu Shalom Yehu is completeness Judges 6:24
יהוה צדקנו Yehu Tsid'qanu Yehu is our righteousness Jeremiah 23:6
יהוה צבאות Yehu Tseva'ot Yehu of the armies 1 Samuel 1:3
אלהים צבאות Elohiym Tseva'ot Elohiym of the armies Psalm 80:7
God
אֵל
el
When reading the Bible it is better to have an Ancient Hebrew perception of Elohiym rather than our modern western view. The word el was originally written with two pictographic letters, one being an ox head and the other a shepherd staff. The ox represented strength and the staff of the shepherd represented authority. First, the Ancient Hebrews saw Elohiym as the strong one of authority. The shepherd staff was also understood as a staff on the shoulders, a yoke. Secondly, the Ancient Hebrews saw Elohiym as the ox in the yoke. When plowing a field two oxen were placed in a yoke, one was the older more experienced one, and the other was the younger and less experienced. The younger would then learn from the older.
The Hebrews saw Elohiym as the older experienced ox and they as the younger that learns from him.
There are three words in Hebrew that are translated as "God." The word "El" (aleph-lamed) is a common Hebrew word that literally means "powerful one" and is used in the Bible for anything with power such as a god (Ex 34:14), a mountain (Ps 36:6) and God (Gen 14:18). The word "elo'ah" (aleph-lamed-vav-hey) is also translated as God but more literally means "one who yokes to another." The root of this word is alah (aleph-lamed-hey) and means an oath in the sense of being a "binding yoke" (Gen 26:28). The third word is elohiym (aleph-lamed-hey-yud-mem) and is the plural form of the word elo'ah (
The Hebrew name for God is a four letter word spelled with four Hebrew letters, yud, hey, vav, hey and transliterated into English as YHVH. There are three problems when trying to find the pronunciation of this name. First, Modern Hebrew pronunciation is slightly different than modern ancient Hebrew pronunciation. We do not know for certain how Ancient Hebrew was pronounced. For example the letter vav is pronounced with a "v" in modern Hebrew but was more likly pronounced with a "w" hence the often seen transliteration YHWH.Secondly, each of these letters were used as a consonant or a vowel in Ancient Hebrew. For instance, the letter vav (waw) could be a "W," "O" or "U." Thirdly, vowels are frequently used in Hebrew words but not written. For example, the word MLK could be pronounced melek (king, a noun) or malak (to reign, a verb). If the letters in the name were used as consonants we do not know what vowel sounds were associated with name.
The two most common prounciations are Jehovah and Yahweh. Yahweh is a possible translation but not Jehovah as there is no "J" in Hebrew. But, it should be noted that the letter "J" was originally pronounced as a "Y" and Yehovah is a possible translation (if the vav was pronounced with a "w"). Other possible pronunciations include Yehowah, Yahueh, Yihweh, Yahwah and Yahuh.
Hebrew Names in the Bible