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JEHO′VAH. A word used four times in theAuthorized Version of the English Bible asthe name of the national deity of the Hebrews.This name was carried over from the earlierreligious period of that people to the laterpost-exilic time, when, largely through the influenceof the prophets, the transformation of thenational god into the one universal God of amonotheistic faith took place. In consequence, thepronunciation of the name of the old tribal deitywas avoided, partly because of associations whichseemed to imply limitations to His being, partlybecause of the growth of the sentiment that thegenuine name of the one God was too sacred, toopowerful to be used except on extraordinaryoccasions and by any but those who were commissionedas His representatives on earth — the highpriests. The name was expressed in writing,according to the usual method in Hebrew, withoutvowels, by the four consonants corresponding toour YHWH — the tetragrammaton, as it is called.When the vowels were added to the consonantaltext of the Old Testament, several centuries afterthe birth of Christ, as a means of preserving thepronunciation of the sacred literature, those ofAdonai, ‘my lord,’ were attached to thetetragrammaton as an indication that the holy namewas to be pronounced as though it wereadonai(q.v.). By a misunderstanding, Christian scholarsin the sixteenth century combined the vowelsof Adonai with the consonantal frame, thusproducing the form Yehowah or Jehovah,jbeing used for the Hebrewy andv forw,as was very customary. The earliest occurrenceof this word is 1520. In the EnglishBible the tetragrammaton is usually representedby ‘thelord.’ The avoidance of the use of thename of the Supreme Deity led to the loss ofthe true pronunciation, and we have no absolutelycertain data for determining what it was. It isvery probable, however, that it was Yahweh, andthis form and pronimciation are now universallyused by scholars. .Jehovah is often used as aname of God, connoting especially His power andmajesty. The name of the Hebrew deity is alsofound in abbreviated form asYah (as inhallaluYah, ‘praise ye Yah’),Yahu,Yeho, andYo,particularly in proper names. The origin and meaningof the name are not known. It has beenconnected with the verbhaya, to be, with the meaning‘he is,’ implying existence without limitation.Another theory connects it with the causativeform of the same verb with the meaning ‘hecauses to be,’ i.e. the Creator. Still anothertheory makes it mean ‘he who causes to fall’(i.e. rain or lightning), a view which has somesupport by analogy with the use of similar termsfor the Greek Zeus. Others have sought to identifyYahweh with some foreign deity, orconsider it a piece of popular etymologizing like theEnglish derivation of God from good. Consult:Dalman,Der Gottesname Adonai (Leipzig,1896); Driver, “The Tetragrammaton,” inStudiaBiblica (Oxford, 1885); Smend,AlttestamentlicheReligionsgeschichte (Freiburg, 1893);Schultz,Alttestamentliche Theologie (Göttingen,1889).
