Jehovah

Usage in Scripture

Jehovah is the most common proper name for God in the Old Testament. It is said to occur roughly 6,800 times in the Old Testament. It first appears in Genesis 2:4, in the expression rendered "the LORD God."

The passage that most directly explains the meaning of the name is Exodus 3. Speaking from the burning bush, God tells Moses, "I AM THAT I AM," and then declares, "this is my name for ever" (Exodus 3:12–15). The third of the Ten Commandments reads, "Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain" (Exodus 20:7). In passages such as Isaiah 43:10–11, the name designates the one and only Savior whom Israel worships.

Meaning and Pronunciation

The Hebrew Bible writes this name with only four consonants, YHWH. These four letters are commonly called the Tetragrammaton (the four letters of the divine name). Many scholars associate the name with a Hebrew verb meaning "to be" or "to exist."

To avoid pronouning the name lightly, Jews substituted Adonai, meaning "Lord," when reading aloud. As a result, the original pronunciation has not been preserved with certainty. The Masoretic Text wrote the consonants YHWH with the vowels of Adonai. In the West, reading this written form literally produced the form "Jehovah." "Yahweh" is the form that modern scholars reconstruct as the original pronunciation. The Septuagint rendered the name with the Greek word Kyrios ("Lord").

Connection to the New Testament

Following the practice of the Septuagint, the New Testament renders the name as "Lord." In Romans 10:13–14, Paul quotes Joel 2:32, "whosoever shall call on the name of the LORD shall be delivered," and applies it to calling on the Lord. Many church traditions read the passage confessing Jesus Christ as "Lord" (Philippians 2:9–11) and Jesus' words "I am" (John 8:58) in light of Exodus 3. This reading is cited as one basis for the doctrine of the Trinity.

Interpretations and Issues

• Rendering in translation: The New Korean Revised Version uses "Jehovah" (Yeohowa), the Korean Common Translation uses "Yahweh" (Yahwe), and the New Korean Standard Version generally renders it as "Lord" (Ju). Which rendering is preferable is one topic in the Bible translation debate.
• Exodus 6:3: This verse states that the name was not made known to the patriarchs: "but by my name JEHOVAH was I not known to them" (Exodus 6:2–3). Yet the name already appears in Genesis. Conservative interpreters take this to mean that God had not yet made the meaning of the name known to them through actual experience. Some critical scholars regard it as evidence that different sources were combined.
• Emphasis on use of the name: Jehovah's Witnesses emphasize calling God by the name "Jehovah" as central to their faith. Major Protestant denominations place greater weight on confessing the God to whom the name refers than on the name itself.

In the Korean Church

Because Korean Protestantism has long used Bibles in the Korean Revised Version tradition, the rendering "Jehovah" (Yeohowa) is the most familiar. Verses containing this rendering, such as Psalm 23:1 ("The LORD is my shepherd"), are widely memorized. Compound expressions formed with the name, such as Jehovah-jireh, are frequently used in preaching and worship songs. The "jah" in Hallelujah, often exclaimed in worship, is a shortened form of this name.