Pronouncing YHWH

[PacMan]

I found this fascinating.  I am interested in two things:
(1) Is anyone aware of corroborating evidence of this from antiquity?
(2) If true, does it impact or correspond to other understandings you have of the OT, NT, Restoration, other traditions, etc.

 

 

 

[The Nehor]

1. No.

[Frank11]

That is an interesting observation.

Although the meaning of YHWH has nothing to do with breathing, the Hebrew word “Ruach”, which is usually translated as Holy Spirit in the Old Testament, does.

“Ruach” primarily means moving wind or breath. Breathing is first and foremost the most important thing a man needs.  

Edited August 28, 2024 by Frank11

[webbles]

Early Hebrew didn't use vowels.  So the fact that YHWH doesn't have vowels in the written form doesn't mean it didn't actually have vowels in the pronounced form.  But we don't know which vowels to use because Jews have never pronounced the word.  Modern observant Jews will replace it with "Adonai" or "Elohim" when they are reading the scriptures.  They don't even read "Jehovah" or "Yahweh" which are later guesses on what vowels should go in the word.

[Pyreaux]

Other than the name is deemed ineffable, it was only ever spoken once a year by a priest during the Day of Atonement, so never in public since 70 A.D., not only are there no vowels in written Hebrew, spoken Hebrew had been a dead language for a thousand years.

No one knows how to pronounce it, maybe the exception of "Yah" because it is at the end of popular Jewish names.

 

 

[Dario_M]

Is he actually from the LDS community if i may be so free to ask  @PacMan ? 

Edited August 29, 2024 by Dario_M

[manol]

I'll readily accept criticism that my priorities are misplaced, but I have too much respect for Judaism to want to decipher how to properly pronounce yud hei vav hei.  Imo that's not part of my job description at this time. 

[Stargazer]

On 8/29/2024 at 6:12 AM, Dario_M said:

Is he actually from the LDS community if i may be so free to ask  @PacMan ? 

No. He is Kong Hee, founder and senior pastor of the City Harvest Church in Singapore. 

[Stargazer]

On 8/28/2024 at 11:32 PM, PacMan said:

I found this fascinating.  I am interested in two things:
(1) Is anyone aware of corroborating evidence of this from antiquity?
(2) If true, does it impact or correspond to other understandings you have of the OT, NT, Restoration, other traditions, etc.

 

 

This gentleman is talking gibberish. It might sound profound if one doesn't know any different, but he's making it up out of his own imagination. 

Look him up: Kong Hee

Edited August 31, 2024 by Stargazer

[Dario_M]

1 hour ago, Stargazer said:

No. He is Kong Hee, founder and senior pastor of the City Harvest Church in Singapore. 

Oh really? Never heard of Kong Hee. 

[Stargazer]

13 minutes ago, Dario_M said:

Oh really? Never heard of Kong Hee. 

Neither had I until today. A link to his Wiki bio was included in my post.

[SeekingUnderstanding]

On 8/28/2024 at 4:32 PM, PacMan said:

I found this fascinating.  I am interested in two things:
(1) Is anyone aware of corroborating evidence of this from antiquity?
(2) If true, does it impact or correspond to other understandings you have of the OT, NT, Restoration, other traditions, etc.

 

 

 

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTNEW3VvN/
 

[InCognitus]

4 hours ago, SeekingUnderstanding said:

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTNEW3VvN/
 

As soon as I saw the opening video, I knew Dan would have a critique on it.  

[PacMan]

On 8/31/2024 at 6:02 PM, SeekingUnderstanding said:

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTNEW3VvN/
 

Unfortunately, I don’t have tik-tok. 
 

And more unfortunately, Dan McClellan’s utility is limited. His typical conclusory ipse dixit is not only heavy-handed, hyperbolic, and unhelpful but conveniently (and suspiciously) supportive of his personal ideologies. It’s hard to take him seriously, which is too bad.

 

And after finally getting around the app, Dan’s commentary is consistently disappointing. That’s not to say Dan’s wrong. But it would be infinitely more helpful if Dan sticks to what he knows-that there is no supporting evidence for something (that YHWH isn’t connected phonetically to breathing)-as opposed to calling something false or nonsense. 

Edited September 2, 2024 by PacMan

[SeekingUnderstanding]

1 hour ago, PacMan said:

Unfortunately, I don’t have tik-tok. 

You don't need TikTok. Just a web browser

1 hour ago, PacMan said:

And more unfortunately, Dan McClellan’s utility is limited. His typical conclusory ipse dixit is not only heavy-handed, hyperbolic, and unhelpful but conveniently (and suspiciously) supportive of his personal ideologies.

You have this backwards I think. It's a common mistake people make when they are into apologetics. Dan's page is not about his personal beliefs. He rarely goes into them aside from issues of social justice. It's about what the data can support by taking the text as it is. Without presupposing any of our dogma or ideology onto the text. It isn't the only way to approach scripture. It may not provide the most meaning in your life, but that is what his page is about. And the data says that the video shown in the OP is completely unsupported by the historical record and contradicted by everything we know about how the Adonai was pronounced anciently. 

[Rain]

10 hours ago, SeekingUnderstanding said:

You don't need TikTok. Just a web browser

Neither chrome or samsung browser will let me open it on my phone.  I have to do it on my computer. Not complaining - just people without computer access may not be able to do it.

10 hours ago, SeekingUnderstanding said:

You have this backwards I think. It's a common mistake people make when they are into apologetics. Dan's page is not about his personal beliefs. He rarely goes into them aside from issues of social justice. It's about what the data can support by taking the text as it is. Without presupposing any of our dogma or ideology onto the text. It isn't the only way to approach scripture. It may not provide the most meaning in your life, but that is what his page is about. And the data says that the video shown in the OP is completely unsupported by the historical record and contradicted by everything we know about how the Adonai was pronounced anciently. 

 

Edited September 2, 2024 by Rain

[SeekingUnderstanding]

10 hours ago, Rain said:

Neither chrome of samsung browser will let me open it on my phone.  I have to do it on my computer. Not complaining - just people without computer access may not be able to do it.

 

Ah! Will link YouTube in future. 
 

ETA: I just tried and I got it to work in a mobile browser, but I had to request desktop site. It’s on me to make it more accessible or provide a summary though so thanks. 

Edited September 2, 2024 by SeekingUnderstanding

[ZealouslyStriving]

One of the shiny, new things I was attracted to for a time in my wilderness journey was the Hebrew Roots Movement.

The "proper" pronunciation of YHWH and the "correct" calendar are the two major things that divide and pit groups against each one another.

Even though it lacks any supporting evidence (like all the theories) I like the breath in, breath out idea the best.

[PacMan]

16 hours ago, SeekingUnderstanding said:

You don't need TikTok. Just a web browser

You have this backwards I think. It's a common mistake people make when they are into apologetics. Dan's page is not about his personal beliefs. He rarely goes into them aside from issues of social justice. It's about what the data can support by taking the text as it is. Without presupposing any of our dogma or ideology onto the text. It isn't the only way to approach scripture. It may not provide the most meaning in your life, but that is what his page is about. And the data says that the video shown in the OP is completely unsupported by the historical record and contradicted by everything we know about how the Adonai was pronounced anciently. 

This isn't about apologetics (at least my apologetics).  But Dan absolutely promotes his academic views to support his personal beliefs.  He does it all the time and doesn't pretend to separate them.

I don't need to agree with an academic to appreciate his or her insight.  Dan, however, is not just dismissive but insulting to those that he disagrees and tends toward wild and unsupported hyperbole.  That is not a hallmark for a good scholar but the childish use of the bully pulpit.  Indeed, Dan needs to understand that the expert's opinion is second in value to the expert's analysis.  But Dan too commonly hides behind an naked opinion (clothed in demagoguery) to avoid good analysis.

For example, Dan says: "...that the divine name was pronounced without vowels is pure and utter nonsense.  There has never been a single moment in the history of Hebrew where the vowels were not pronounced."

Really?  (1) Considering the pronunciation of the divine name is lost, I'm not sure how Dan can make that claim (because, as he tends to do, he actually doesn't explain the basis for his opinion).  (2) How in the world can he opine about every single moment in the the history of Hebrew?

To use one of Dan's favorites, it's "laughable."

Dan is a smart guy but a terrible academic.

[SeekingUnderstanding]

41 minutes ago, PacMan said:

For example, Dan says: "...that the divine name was pronounced without vowels is pure and utter nonsense.  There has never been a single moment in the history of Hebrew where the vowels were not pronounced."

So Hebrew is written with no vowels. If I picked a Hebrew word at random, proclaimed that anciently (with absolutely no supporting evidence) a certain word was pronounced without the vowels, you would object to a Hebrew scholar calling that nonsense? We are working with very different definitions of the word. When is it okay to use the word?
 

If you disagree with Dan’s assessment, do you have any evidence that any words are pronounced without vowels in Hebrew? Please show your work. 

Edited September 2, 2024 by SeekingUnderstanding

[InCognitus]

2 hours ago, PacMan said:

For example, Dan says: "...that the divine name was pronounced without vowels is pure and utter nonsense.  There has never been a single moment in the history of Hebrew where the vowels were not pronounced."

Really?  (1) Considering the pronunciation of the divine name is lost, I'm not sure how Dan can make that claim (because, as he tends to do, he actually doesn't explain the basis for his opinion).  (2) How in the world can he opine about every single moment in the the history of Hebrew?

Basically the guy in the opening video is asserting that since no vowels were written then that must have been the way they pronounced it, but that's simply not how Hebrew works. 

So, what Dan says above is absolutely true.  Ancient written Hebrew did not include vowels.  But all Hebrew words were pronounced with vowels.  Therefore to assert that "the divine name was pronounced without vowels" is pure and utter nonsense.  The only reason we know how to pronounce ancient Hebrew words at all is because of traditional usage, and the vowel points were added to the written text later (sometime after 600 AD).  And since the divine name was not pronounced in later Talmudic Jewish traditions there is no modern usage baseline for knowing what vowels may have been used when pronouncing it.

This has nothing to do with Dan's "beliefs", these are scholarly facts.  So I don't understand your disagreement with what he is saying.

Edited September 2, 2024 by InCognitus
Added "written" for clarification

[Calm]

9 minutes ago, InCognitus said:

Ancient Hebrew did not include vowels.

Ancient written Hebrew…just in case anyone gets confused on this

Edited September 2, 2024 by Calm

[Rain]

The guy talked about the name being the sound of breath.  But if this happens because no vowels are pronounced then it is going to happen with a whole lot of of words especially since not everyone is going to make the same breathing sound as everyone else when they are born and when they die. 

It reminds me of the Princess Bride "to blave/blathe".

[InCognitus]

1 minute ago, Calm said:

Ancient written Hebrew…just in case anyone gets confused on this

Thank you, I corrected it .  I know what I was thinking but it sometimes takes a separate pair of eyes to point out ambiguity.  

[PacMan]

2 hours ago, SeekingUnderstanding said:

So Hebrew is written with no vowels. If I picked a Hebrew word at random, proclaimed that anciently (with absolutely no supporting evidence) a certain word was pronounced without the vowels, you would object to a Hebrew scholar calling that nonsense? We are working with very different definitions of the word. When is it okay to use the word?
 

If you disagree with Dan’s assessment, do you have any evidence that any words are pronounced without vowels in Hebrew? Please show your work. 

Now you're cherry-picking.  First, nonsense is completely subjective and, therefore, unhelpful.  A real academic would say it is unsupported.  Second, Dan still can't know every moment in Hebrew history.

As to showing my work, you are completely misreading (perhaps intentionally?).  I'm not disagreeing with Dan's ultimate conclusion.  I have no basis to believe that the divine name was ever pronounced without vowels.  Rather, I disagree with Dan's lack of analysis, his hyperbole, and bombastic certitude--all of which undermine his status as useful.