Did a Catholic Monk Provide Consonants to Invent Jehovah?

One claims that I have been duped, and that the Catholic monk did change the name in 12 AD. Of course, in 12 AD, Jesus had not even begun his ministry and there were no Catholic monks. I suspect that 1200 AD was actually meant.

As presented above, however, it should be evident that Martini evidently simply gave a Latinized form of one of the forms of the Holy Name as it is found in the ancient Hebrew Text. He did not invent the name itself, nor did the Masoretes invent the name itself, for the name itself had already been existing for many millennia. No human invented the name itself at any time.

One claims:



My response:

While I do not at all believe that a Catholic monk "made up" the English form "Jehovah" way back in the 1300s, the English form Jehovah is based on a form used in the Hebrew Masoretic text. If that form is "made up" by anyone, then so is every other English form of any Biblical name that is given in English, including the English form "Jesus", and even the English form "YHWH". How does one even pronounce the English form often given as YHWH?

I know that it is often claimed that Jehovah was the invention of a Spanish monk (Raymundus Martini) in 1270; some have claimed that he did this by inserting the consonants for the words often transliterated as "Elohim" and "Adonai" in between the four Hebrew letters representing the tetragrammaton of God's Holy Name in Hebrew, which he, as it has been asserted, "translated into 'Jehova' or 'Jehovah'". Regardless, such often claim that "Jehovah is a false name" "made up by a Catholic monk", which is simply false.

Related to this, it is often claimed that Jews do not believe in saying the sacred name out loud, although in reality, I do not know of any Jew that does not give some vocalization to the Holy Name, whether it be the English "the Lord", or "Adonai", or, "HaShem", or something else. I do not know of anyone, whether Jew or not, when reading the Bible, totally skips over the instances where the Holy Name appears, without giving some pronunciation to the Holy Name. The form in the which the Holy Name is most often mispronounced in English is "the Lord".

If the assertion that the "Jehovah" is a "made up" name are valid, then similar would be true also of the English "Jesus", "Joshua", and every form of every Hebrew name that is presented in English. It would also be true of the most popular form of mispronouncing the Holy Name by the English substitue: "the Lord". Those promoting the assertions, however, most often fail to reason about such, and many of them may assert that the Holy Name is ineffable, unpronounceable, although no scripture says such.

The reality is that Raymundus Martini presented a Latin form of the Holy Name as "Yohoua". As best as I can determine, Martini never stated where he obtained the vowels to make the Latin form, "Yohoua". The real point is that Martini never used the later English form "Jehovah" at all,

The reality is that the English form "Jehovah" is based on the most common form of the Holy Name as presented in the Masoretic Hebrew text. There is no evidence whatsoever that any Spanish monk made this name up.

Related to this, many often make a similar claim is that the Masoretes themselves made the name up by inserting vowels from Adonai and/or Elohim into the tetragrammaton to form Jehovah (or, Yehowah); this also, however, is an assumption that has been repeated so many times that it has become accepted as fact. Some scholars, however, have shown that this assumption is not true. The truth is that, since no Hebrew word had any written vowels, the Masoretes, in producing their vowels points, in fact, inserted such written vowels into every word in Hebrew, including the word representing God's Holy Name. Nevertheless, many seem to single out the Holy Name as though it was the only word that did not have written vowels. Often these will present the Holy Name in an unpronounceable English transliterated form such as YHWH or JHVH. Some translations have supplied these as English forms of the Holy Name.

Nevertheless, the original Hebrew has no written vowels at all for any name or any word whatsoever. The vowels were spoken, however, although they were not written, thus the words, including God's Holy Name, did have vowels in the original Hebrew.

Nonetheless, the English form "Jehovah", and the vowels in that English form, were not originally provided by any Catholic monk; the written vowels in Hebrew were provided by the Masoretes long before any Monk provided a Latin form of the Holy Name from the Masoretic Hebrew text. The Masoretes provided at least two different variations of the Holy Name, depending on the context. This indicates that the Holy Name may not have had just one original pronunciation, but at least two, depending on the sounds in the context.

However, many who claim that one should not pronounce the Holy Name in English because we do not know for a certainty how it was originally pronounced, should realize that, then, to be consistent, we should not pronounce the name of the Messiah, either. As with all Hebrew words, the forms (there are several) as found in the original Hebrew did not have any written vowels; the written vowel points were supplied by the Masoretes. Both "Jesus" and "Joshua", however, being of English spelling and pronunciation, are not the same pronunciation as the original Hebrew, and no one on earth knows for a certainty how the name of the Messiah was originally pronounced in the original Hebrew.

On the other hand, the Jews who claim that pronouncing the Holy Name is not appropriate, do not, in fact, refrain from pronouncing the name, but they often will indeed say the name as being Adonai (Lord), Elohim (God), HaShem (the name), or as something else. If they would not actually say the Holy Name at all, they would have to read Deuteronomy 6:4 as "Hear, Israel: -- is our God; -- is one," which, of course, ends up being nonsense. If a Jew reads aloud Deuteronomy 6:4 from the Jewish Publication Society translation, he will be saying, "Hear, O Israel: the LORD our God, the LORD is one." In effect, he will still be attributing the Holy Name to being "the LORD", and pronouncing, saying, the Holy Name, as being "the LORD". The Hebrew pronunciation of the Holy Name, however, is most definitely NOT "the LORD". Deuteronomy 6:4, in the World English, reads, "Hear, Israel: Yahweh is our God; Yahweh is one." In the American Standard, it reads, "Hear, O Israel: Jehovah our God is one Jehovah." Either of these latter two translations are definitely much better than totally changing the Holy Name to "the LORD", which does not mean the same thing.

Indeed, I do not know of any person, when reading the Bible aloud, who does not pronounce the Holy Name with some kind of oral expression. Most English translations present the Holy Name as "the LORD" or "GOD", and thus most English readers, when reading those translations, do pronounce (or, mispronounce) the Holy Name as "the LORD" or as "GOD", despite claims to the contrary. I do not know of anyone who simply skips the Holy Name so as not to pronounce the Holy Name, despite their claims of not pronouncing the Holy Name by pronouncing (mispronouncing) the Holy Name as "the LORD" or "GOD", or whatever else. If, however, the Holy Name in English form should presented as "YHWH", how does one pronounce that when reading the Bible?

For links to some of our studies related to God's Holy Name:
nameofyah.blogspot.com/p/on-this-site.html

One stated:

My reply:

If the name Jehovah is a man-made name, then, to be consistent, one would conclude that Jesus, Joshua, Jeshua, Jacob, Abraham, Issaac, Daniel, Samuel, and every name that appears in any English translation of Bible are also man-made names.


It was further stated:

The Hebrew form of the name represented in its English form is found over 6,000 times in the Hebrew of the Old Testament. I assume, however, that by "name" it is being assumed that Jehovah is actually a different name than that found in the Bible? "Names" however, should not be viewed as different name because of difference of spelling and pronunciation that may be found in different languages. The different linguistic forms are simply variations of the same name; they are not actually different names.

No English form of any name is found in the Bible. One will not find the English form, Jesus, in the Bible. Many represent the tetragrammaton of the Holy Name as YHWH, and claim that this the original Hebrew. In reality, one will not find the the English "Y" nor the English "H" nor the English "W" anywhere in the Greek. YHWH is someone's transliteration of the four letters that make up the Holy Name in Hebrew (without any vowels). In reality, the English form "Jehovah" as well as the English form "Yahweh" are not different names than the Hebrew, but rather are both English forms of the same name as found in Hebrew. Thus, the Hebrew form (however it was originally pronounced -- God never told us that His name had to be pronounced in other languages exactly as it was originally pronounced in Hebrew) is the same name as Jehovah and Jehovah is the same name as Yahweh. Jehovah is based on the Hebrew Masoretic text; Yahweh is based on someone's transliteration of the Holy Name as found in the Greek (transliterated into English as IAUE), which evidently left out the middle syllable because it became indistinguishable in the Greek pronunication. Nevertheless the form "Yahweh" was constructed from the transliteration from the Greek as IAUE which was then read back into the Hebrew to form the English "Yahweh".

Therefore, "Yahweh" and "Jehovah" should not be viewed as two different names, but rather as two different forms of the same name, just as Joshua and Jesus are two different forms of the same one name.


Additional statement:

My reply:

I am not with the JWs, and do not defend what they might have stated. It does not matter to me that the English form "Jehovah" was not used by the ancient Hebrew.

Nevertheless, in the video it is evidently using an earlier edition of the book Aid to Bible Understanding, while the "Watchtower Library" disk is using a later edition. I have a copy of the 2011 Watchtower Library and I looked up the references, and I also looked up the page in the Aid book in the "Library", and see that it does not mention Raymundus. I also have a hard copy of the 1971 "Aid" book which appears to be what is used in the video.

The three quotes are given below:

*** w50 12/1 pp. 472-473 An Open Letter to the Catholic Monsignor ***
|--Jehovah was the incorrect pronunciation given to the Hebrew tetragrammaton JHVH in the 14th century by Porchetus de Salvaticis (1303). But let us say: The origin of the word Jehovah used to be attributed to Petrus Galatinus, a Franciscan friar, the confessor of Pope Leo X, in his De Arcanis Catholicae Veritatis, published in 1518. But the latest scholarship has proved he was not the one to introduce the pronunciation Jehovah, and neither was your aforementioned Porchetus de Salvaticis. As shown by Joseph Voisin, the learned editor of the Pugio Fidei (The Poniard of Faith) by Raymundus Martini, Jehovah had been used long before Galatinus. Even a generation before Porchetus de Salvaticis wrote his Victoria contra Judaeos (1303), the Spanish Dominican friar Raymundus Martini wrote his Pugio, about 1278, and used the name Jehovah. In fact, Porchetus took the contents of his Victoria largely from Martini’s Pugio. And Scaliger proves that Galatinus took his De Arcanis bodily from Martini’s Pugio. Galatinus did not introduce the pronunciation Jehovah, but merely defended it against those who pronounced the Hebrew tetragrammaton Jova.--|

I will have to study this for accuracy. I will have to do more research on Porchetus de Salvaticis to see what he actually did present the Holy Name as. [The form Salvaticis used was actually "Yohouah"] I don't know if he was actually saying that whatever form he used was actually the original pronunciation of the Tetragrammaton. "Jehovah", however, is simply based on the form most often presented in the Masoretic Hebrew. Raymundus Martini, however, did not use the form "Jehovah".

*** w80 2/1 p. 11 The Divine Name in Later Times ***
|--
The Divine Name in Later Times

THAT the divine name was used in early history is beyond question. But what about later times? Why have certain Bible translations omitted the name? And what is its meaning and significance to us?

THE NAME “JEHOVAH” BECOMES WIDELY KNOWN

Interestingly, Raymundus Martini, a Spanish monk of the Dominican order, first rendered the divine name as “Jehova.” This form appeared in his book Pugeo Fidei, published in 1270 C.E.—over 700 years ago.

In time, as reform movements developed both inside and outside the Catholic Church, the Bible was made available to the people in general, and the name “Jehovah” became more widely known. In 1611 C.E. the King James or Authorized Version of the Bible was published. It uses the name Jehovah four times. (Ex. 6:3; Ps. 83:18; Isa. 12:2; 26:4) Since then, the Bible has been translated many, many times. Some translations follow the example of the Authorized Version and include the divine name only a few times.

In this category is An American Translation (by Smith and Goodspeed) with a slight variation of using “Yahweh” instead of “Jehovah.” Yet, one may ask: “Why have the translators done this? If using ‘Jehovah’ or ‘Yahweh’ is wrong, why put it in at all? If right, why not be consistent and use it every time it appears in the Bible text?”
--|

This is in error, since Raymundus Martnini did not present the Holy Name as "Jehova". The reality is that Raymundus Martini presented a Latin form of the Holy Name as "Yohoua". As best as I can determine, Martini never stated where he obtained the vowels to make the Latin form, "Yohoua". The real point is that Martini never used the later English form "Jehovah" at all.

I believe, if I remember my studies correctly, someone edited his works later and changed his usage to another form; it may have been that the edited edition may read "Jehova".

*** na p. 17 God’s Name and Bible Translators ***
|--
In time, God’s name came back into use. In 1278 it appeared in Latin in the work Pugio fidei (Dagger of Faith), by Raymundus Martini, a Spanish monk. Raymundus Martini used the spelling Yohoua. Soon after, in 1303, Porchetus de Salvaticis completed a work entitled Victoria Porcheti adversus impios Hebraeos (Porchetus’ Victory Against the Ungodly Hebrews). In this he, too, mentioned God’s name, spelling it variously Iohouah, Iohoua and Ihouah. Then, in 1518, Petrus Galatinus published a work entitled De arcanis catholicae veritatis (Concerning Secrets of the Universal Truth) in which he spells God’s name Iehoua.
--|

The author of this contradicts the statement quoted earlier, in that he does not say that de Salvaticis presented the Holy Name as "Jehovah", but with some other forms. The forms given do not, however, represent any transliteration of forms from the Masoretic text, so I am not sure where the forms came from.


The video presents from the earlier edition of the "Aid" book, the following:

|--
By combining the vowel signs of 'Adho-nay' and 'Elo-him' withe four consonants of the Tetragrammaton the pronunication Yeho-wah' and Yeho-wih' were formed. The first of these provided the basis for the Latinized form "Jehova(h)." The first recorded use of this form dates from the thirteenth century C.E. Raymundus Martinin, a Spanish monk of the Dominican Order, used it in his book Pugeo Fidei of the year 1270.
--|

The problem with what is presented in the earlier edition is that the idea that the Masoretes took vowel points from other words to form the Hebrew often transliterated as "Yehowah" and "Yehowih" is evidently a theory that was later presented by Christian writer, and which has been told and retold so many times that people just accept it as fact without actual investigation. I have found no evidence that the Masoretes actually took vowels from any other word(s) to supply in the tetragrammaton of the Holy Name.

The later edition leaves out the reference to Raymundus Martini, and simply states:

*** it-2 p. 7 Jehovah ***
|--
What is the proper pronunciation of God’s name?
In the second half of the first millennium C.E., Jewish scholars introduced a system of points to represent the missing vowels in the consonantal Hebrew text. When it came to God’s name, instead of inserting the proper vowel signs for it, they put other vowel signs to remind the reader that he should say 'Adho·nai' (meaning “Sovereign Lord”) or 'Elo·him' (meaning “God”).
--|

This also repeats basically the same thing as stated in the earlier edition, which, I believe is in error. I haven't found any evidence that the Masoretes "put other vowels signs to remind the reader that he should say 'Adho·nai' ... or 'Elo·him'." As best as I have been able to determine, the idea that the Masoretes did not insert what they believed to the proper vowels signs for the Holy Name is just someone's theory, which has been repeated over and over so many times that it is accepted as fact. Nevertheless, if the Masoretes did insert what they believed were the proper vowel points still does not mean that they were necessarily correct; we have no way of assuring that the vowel points that they have supplied us for any Hebrew word actually represents the way they were originally pronounced in ancient Hebrew.