“What is His name, or His son’s name? Surely you know!”
Proverbs 30:4e.
Agur and Job
both knew the Name of God, and Agur draws attention to His Name in this final
question posed in verse 4. Consider the English translation (in this case the
NASB) of verse 9a: “That I not be full and deny You and say, “Who is the LORD?”
Since the word
LORD is capitalized, we know that the Hebrew word is the tetragrammaton, the
four Hebrew letters that comprise the name Yahweh.
Job also knew
His Name; “He [Job] said, Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I shall
return there. The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away, Blessed be the name of
the LORD.” (Job 2:21 – 22).
Do we know His
Name? Probably not. Few folks in a Sunday school class or small group could
correctly answer Agur’s question – and these are people motivated enough to be
in such groups; imagine the responses from an average congregation in a Sunday
service.
This is curious
on a few fronts. One curiosity is that many professing Christians would have
some degree of heartburn if we quit using the name Jesus, Christ, or Jesus
Christ, when referring to our Lord and Savior. After all, didn’t Peter preach,
“And there is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven
that has been given among men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12)?
Paul writes in
Philippians 2:10 - 11, “so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, of
those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and that every tongue
will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”
Suppose we
started substituting “Lord and Savior” for every time the name “Jesus” appears
in the New Testament? Of course we’d capitalize these words so that the
informed reader would know that they mean “Jesus.” How would this work for us?
If such a
practice, that of not using the name Jesus, would be unacceptable and thought
not faithful to the Biblical text, then why do we maintain this practice of
substituting LORD for Yahweh? Should we change this practice? Is it important?
If so, why is it important?
This is not
something we think about, or if we do, we don’t think about it much, which is
pretty amazing considering that the name Yahweh appears over 6,800 times in the
Old Testament and carries with it the special revelation of the Creator and the
Covenant God who is holy and just and perfect and who keeps Covenant with His
People.
Consider:
“The name
Yahweh is a strong tower; the righteous runs into it and is safe.” Prov. 18:10.
“In that day you
will say, Give thanks to Yahweh, call on His name.” Isa. 12:4
“Indeed, while
following the way of Your judgments, O Yahweh, we have waited for You eagerly; Your
name, even Your memory, is the desire of our souls.” Isa. 26:8
“Therefore thus
says Yahweh…they will sanctify My name.” Isa. 29:22 – 23.
“I am Yahweh, that
is My name, I will not give My glory to another, nor My praise to graven
images.” Isa. 42:8
“Who is among
you that fears Yahweh?...let him trust in the name of Yahweh and rely on
his God.” Isa. 50:10.
There is a
difference between reading the above using “LORD” and reading the above using
“Yahweh.” If this difference is not readily apparent, I think it will become
apparent with practice, that is, if we train ourselves to read “Yahweh” when we
see “LORD” we will, I think, begin to see the weight of glory and revelation that
His Name carries throughout the Old Testament. After all, the name Yahweh is on
virtually every page of the Old Testament and He is anything but a nebulous god
indistinguishable from the false gods of both ancient and modern times.
And let’s remember,
when Yahweh comes to earth in the Incarnation, He comes with the name Jesus,
which means Yahweh-saves.
Let me try to
make a few more points.
The Septuagint
(LXX), the ancient translation of Hebrew Scriptures into Greek, did not transliterate
Yahweh, but substituted the word “Lord.” Also, at some point, Jews stopped pronouncing
the name Yahweh and used the word “Lord.” To argue that we should follow these
examples is unsatisfying, for after all, if Yahweh has revealed His Name to us,
ought not we to use His Name? On page after page of the Hebrew Bible we see the
tetragrammaton, and on page after page of our English Old Testament we see the tetragrammaton
written as “LORD” – how can we intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually
ignore this glorious Name with its rich covenantal heritage, a heritage of
which we are heirs as the seed of Abraham and Messiah (Christ)?
But here is a
warning, there is nothing “magical” about this Name, and there is nothing in
using this Name that makes the person who uses it special or apart from the People
of God who may not use the Name or who may be unaware of its Glory. I have to
write this because we have a propensity to think, “I know something you don’t.
I have a special practice you don’t. I am living at a higher level than you
are.” Yes, such things are childish, but if we aren’t a childish people then I
don’t know what we are, so we need this warning. It seems we will create
divisions and sects at the slightest opportunity. Therefore, if you feel any
inclination to be “special” vis-à-vis the People of God, please forget you read
this and go read about sports or find a Peanuts comic strip – you’ll be better
off…and come back when you grow up in Christ.
Also, note that
the New Testament writers, who wrote in Greek with the likely exception of Mark’s
Gospel, which was likely in Latin, did not use “Yahweh” but rather used “Lord,”
following the style of the LXX. Why did they do this? Or better yet, why did
the Holy Spirit inspire them to do this? Well, of course I don’t really know,
but here are a couple of possibilities. The first is that since the LXX is what
people were familiar with in the Greek – speaking world that it made sense to
communicate in the form of the familiar. The second is that when communicating
with those who did not know the LXX, that using “Lord” instead of “Yahweh” made
getting the Gospel message across much easier.
On the latter,
consider Paul’s challenge to communicate in Athens (Acts 17) to educated
audiences, if they were confused about the True and Living God and the name
Jesus and the resurrection, how much more confusion might there have been had
Paul introduced “Yahweh” into his message?
(I think we may
have a communication model in Genesis chapters 1 and 2. In the first chapter we
see “God” creating the heavens and the earth; then in the second chapter we see
that this God has a name, “the LORD [Yahweh] God” in 2:4.)
Let’s remember,
that Yahweh has revealed Himself in Jesus, in “Yahweh-saves,” and that our
message is one of holistic and complete salvation in Jesus Christ, about living
in koinonia with the Trinity – we must never lose sight of the Gospel and the
Cross. Let us also recall that we have received the Spirit of sonship, which
causes us to cry, “Abba Father” (Rom. 8:15; Gal. 4:6), ushering in a New and
Living Way (Heb. 10:20). It is our Father who is Creator, our Father who is the
God of the Covenant, our Father who appears in the Burning Bush – and so when
reading “Yahweh” we see so much more than was generally revealed to the Old
Testament saints…including the mystery of the Trinity.
I trained myself
long ago to read “Yahweh” when I see “LORD.” This has become natural to me when
reading to myself and when reading aloud. When I read OT Scripture to congregations
and come to “LORD,” I usually point out what the capitalized word actually means
and then I use the word “Yahweh” in my reading. This has been especially true
in pastoral ministry for, after all, are not pastors called to educate their
people? On the other hand, when preaching or speaking evangelistically I use
the English word “Lord” because I want to keep the audience focused on the core
of the Gospel message, once unbelievers become part of the Family we can move
on to other things.
Now I realize
that most people will not care about what I’ve written, or they will think it impractical…but
really, if that is the case, then why don’t we simply remove the name “Yahweh”
from our Hebrew Bibles? Why don’t we stop capitalizing it in English?
There is nothing
quite like reading, “Yahweh is my shepherd…and I will dwell in the house of
Yahweh forever.”
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