God’s Name

‘YHWH (Jehovah/Yahweh; Hebrew: יהוה) – that has been My Name through the ages, and it’s how I shall be remembered from generation to generation.’ –Exodus 3:15

Did you know that the Bible actually gives us God’s personal name? It’s not just ‘God’ or ‘Lord’, as they are titles, not names. In the original Hebrew texts of the Old Testament, God’s Name is represented by four Hebrew letters: יהוה. These four letters are known as the tetragrammaton, which is a Greek word meaning ‘four letters’.

Originally, written Hebrew didn’t show vowels, so when translated into English, these letters are just YHWH or JHVH. If we add some vowels, we get Jehovah or Yahweh or something similar.

Our Bible translation uses God’s Name over 5,500 times.

How Was it Pronounced?

Considering the importance of the Name, surprisingly, nobody knows how to say it!

You see, ancient Hebrew didn’t have written vowels like English does. Imagine trying to pronounce ‘Bbl’ — it could be ‘Bible,’ ‘Babel,’ or ‘bubble,’ right? It’s the same challenge with יהוה.

Scholars speculate that it may have sounded like Yahweh or Yahwa.

However, many commentators miss these points:

Israelite history was about 1,500 years long. The pronounciation probably changed over time.
The pronunciation likely varied from place to place. The Bible reports that people from different regions had different accents, as seen with the Ephraimites in Judges 12:5-6.
The law given to Israel does not outlaw changing pronunciation, so there was nothing to prevent it.

Indeed, an indifference to pronunciation can even be seen in Christian times with the name Jesus. It was pronounced differently in almost every language; Hebrew speakers called him Yeshua and Greek speakers called him Iesous. Not only does it sound completely different, but it even has a different number of syllables! Yet not once do we have any record of people complaining about it!

So we don’t know how YHWH was pronounced, but it seems the ancient people wouldn’t have cared much. Also, since it varied due to time and location, modern guesses may be pretty close to what somebody, somewhere, used in ancient times.

History of the Name

God’s Name is very ancient. It’s use decreased dramatically after the Babylonian exile, but it’s still used today. It’s deeply rooted in history and ancient writings.

See our Timeline of God’s Name

The Spelling ‘Jehovah’

Can sound like ‘jee-ho-vur’, ‘jeh-ho-vur’, or ‘juh-ho-vur’, depending on the accent.

This familiar spelling came about due to a misunderstanding by medieval European scholars. It’s likely very different to the original pronunciation.

Firstly, the letters Y and W developed into J and V in some European languages but not in others, leading to confusion over the pronunciation of the consonants.

Then, the vowels got mixed up! Since Ancient Hebrew didn’t use written vowels, the Masoretes (a group of Jewish scribes) who copied the Hebrew Bible added ‘vowel points’ to guide pronunciation. However, when it came to God’s Name (YHWH), out of reverence, they would instead add the vowel points from the Hebrew words for ‘God’ (Elohim) or ‘Lord’ (Adonai). This would remind readers to say those words instead of God’s Name.

Yes, they were not the vowels of the Name itself. Unfortunately, European scholars didn’t know this! So they wrongly assumed these were the actual vowels, and combined them with JHVH to get ‘Jehovah.’

Although this pronunciation was only caused by a series of mistakes, many feel that it doesn’t matter, as language is always changing anyway. Others disagree, feeling that God’s own name should be a special case, preserved as accurately as possible.

In more recent years, this particular version of the name has gained a bad reputation because of it’s prominent use by the Jehovah’s Witnesses. Former members frequently report that merely seeing or hearing this pronunciation causes them severe emotional upset. Others don’t like using this version because they don’t want to be associated with what many see as a high-demand group who have made many false predictions.

The Spelling ‘Yahweh’

Sounds like the ‘yar-" in ‘yard’, and like the ‘whe-" in ‘where’.

Many English speakers mistakenly say ‘Yahweh’ like ‘yar-way’, which doesn’t align with typical Hebrew pronunciation rules at all.

This is a modern scholarly reconstruction and is considered by many academics to be the most likely original pronunciation of God’s Name. It’s based on linguistic analysis and comparisons with other ancient Semitic languages. However, it’s still just a guess.

The Spelling ‘Yahwa’

Sounds like the ‘ya-" in ‘yack’, plus the ‘wa-" in ‘wag’.

This pronunciation is also a modern guess, but based on how some modern Aramaic speakers pronounce the Name, but with a simpler, more default vowel sound.

While it has some linguistic backing from Aramaic traditions, it remains a good, but unproven, guess. After all, the accents of Aramaic speakers have likely changed over time, and they likely sounded different to the Israelites too.

The Spelling ‘YHWH’

This refers to the literal four Hebrew letters (יהוה) of God’s Name, known as the Tetragrammaton. People usually use it in writing when they don’t want to take sides about the pronunciation.

God’s Name in our translation

Our translation uses the Name wherever we see it in the original texts, usually as a circumlocution. This applies to both Biblical and non-Biblical texts.

We primarily use Jehovah as our default spelling because it’s the most widely known. However, you can use your settings to change it to Yahweh or to the original circumlocution in our source manuscript.