JEHOVAH is the current European transcription of the sacred tetragrammaton ∏ι∏*. This was punctuated by the Massorets with the vowels ë (for d), o l a of the word Adonai which the later Jews habitually substituted in reading the ineffable name. It is now generally agreed that Jahwé (Yahwé) is the true pronunciation, a conclusion which is supported not only by the linguistic argument derived from the fact that the various contracted forms in which the name appears, either separately (Jah) or in compound proper names (Jô, Jδho, Jâhu) are all reducible to Jahw, but also by the testimony of ancient tradition (thus Theodoret ascribes the pronunciation '}αβε to the Samaritans, Epiphanius gives Ια∕3ε or , Iaυε, and Clement apparently Ιαoυe). Etymologically, Jahwé may be regarded as the imperfect either of Qal or Hiphil of m∏; the former view seems to be that taken in the Pentateuch, but many critics now incline to the other, according to which the name may be translated as meaning “He who causes to be.” It seems to have come to be invested with new and richer meanings as the religion of Israel developed in spirituality and depth; but as the name of the national deity it must have been older than the time of Moses; at least the name of the mother of Moses is compounded with it. It is conceivable that in the earliest period of its history the word was not associated with any idea so high even as that of “creator the Hiphil of ∏i∏ in the Aramaic sense of “fall” would give “he who causes (rain or lightning) to fall” as the nearest approach to the original meaning. For the later sense of the name Exod. iii. 14 is the locus classicus. The Palestinian tradition finds in this verse the assertion of God’s eternity (comp. Rev. i. 8); the ...

יהוה the proper and incommunicable name of the Divine Essence. That this divine name, Jehovah, was well known to the Heathens, there can be no doubt. Sanchoniathon writes _Jebo_; Diodorus, the Sicilian, Macrobius, St. Clemens Alexandrinus, St. Jerom, and Origen, pronounce _Jao_; Epiphanius, Theodoret, and the Samaritans, _Jabe_, _Javé_. We likewise find in the ancients, _Jahoh_, _Javo_, _Javu_, _Jaod_. The Moors call their god _Jaba_, whom some believe to be the same as Jehovah. The Latins, in all probability, took their _Javis_, or _Jovis Pater_, from Jehovah. The Jews, after their captivity in Babylon, out of an excessive and superstitious respect for this name, left off to pronounce it, and thus lost the true pronunciation. The Septuagint generally renders it Κύριος, “the Lord.” Origen, St. Jerom, and Eusebius, testify that in their time the Jews left the name of Jehovah written in their copies in Samaritan characters, instead of writing it in the common Chaldee or Hebrew characters; which shows their veneration for this holy name: and the fear they were under, lest strangers, who were not unacquainted with the Chaldee letters and language, should discover and misapply it. The Jews call this name of God the Tetragrammaton, or the name with four letters. It would be waste of time and patience to repeat all that has been said on this incommunicable name: it may not be amiss, however, to remind the reader, 1. That although it signifies the state of being, yet it forms no verb. 2. It never assumes a plural form. 3. It does not admit an article, or take an affix. 4. Neither is it placed in a state of construction with other words; though other words may be in construction with it. It seems to be a compound of יה, _the essence_, and הוה, _existing_; ...