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Second Temple Judaism

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Second Temple Judaism refers to the religion of Judaism during the Second Temple period, between the construction of the second Jewish temple in Jerusalem in 515 BCE, and its destruction by the Romans in 70 CE. This period witnessed major historical upheavals and significant religious changes that would affect not only Judaism but also Christianity (which calls it the Intertestamental period). The origins of the authority of scripture, of the centrality of law and morality in religion, of the synagogue and of apocalyptic expectations for the future all developed in the Judaism of this period.


Contents  [hide]
1 Sources
2 History 2.1 Babylonian captivity
2.2 Return from Babylonian captivity
2.3 Hellenistic Judaism
3 Late Second Temple Period 3.1 Maccabees
3.2 Pompey's siege of Jerusalem in 63 BCE
3.3 Roman Province of Judea
3.4 Jewish sects
3.5 Hillel and Shammai
3.6 Messianic movements
3.7 Jewish-Roman wars
4 Attempt to rebuild the Temple
5 See also
6 References

Sources[edit]
The primary literary sources for information about Second Temple Judaism are Ezra-Nehemiah, the Books of the Maccabees and other Biblical Apocrypha, the Dead Sea Scrolls, Old Testament pseudepigrapha, the works of Josephus and Philo, the Mishnah, and the New Testament and New Testament Apocrypha.
History[edit]
Babylonian captivity[edit]
Main article: Babylonian captivity
The deportation and exile of Jews of the ancient Kingdom of Judah to Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar II, starting with the first deportation in 597 BCE[1] and continuing after the fall of Jerusalem and destruction of the Temple in 587 BCE,[2] resulted in dramatic changes to Jewish culture and religion. During the 70-year exile in Babylon, Jewish houses of assembly (known in Hebrew as a "beit knesset" or in Greek as a "synagogue") and houses of prayer (Greek: προσευχαί, proseuchai; Hebrew Beit Tefilah), were the primary meeting places for prayer, and the house of study ("beit midrash") was the counterpart for the synagogue.
During the period of captivity, Jews continued to practice and develop their religious traditions, many of which became distinct from their origins, due to the influences of the local culture, and religion.
The Babylonian captivity had a number of consequences for Judaism and the Jewish culture, including changes to the Hebrew alphabet and changes in the fundamental practices and customs of the Jewish religion. Many[who?] suggest the people of Israel were henotheists during the First Temple period, believing each nation had its own god but that theirs was superior.[3][4] Others suggest the people of Israel and Judah were polytheists,[5] citing for example the presence of an asherah in the Temple.[6] Some suggest that strict monotheism developed during the Babylonian Exile, perhaps in reaction to Zoroastrian dualism.[7]
Return from Babylonian captivity[edit]


 This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (November 2008)
After the overthrow of Babylonia by the Persian Empire in 538 BCE,[8] the Persian Cyrus the Great gave Jews permission to return to Judea,[9][10][11] and more than 40,000 are said to have returned according to the Biblical accounts of Jehoiakim, Ezra, and Nehemiah.[12]
Cyrus did not, however, allow the restoration of the Judean monarchy, which left the Judean priests as the dominant authority. Without the constraining power of the monarchy, the authority of the Temple in civic life was amplified. It was around this time that the Sadducee party emerged as the party of priests and allied elites. However, the Second Temple (completed 515 BCE) had been constructed under the auspices of a foreign power, and there were lingering questions about its legitimacy. This provided the condition for the development of various sects or "schools of thought", each of which claimed exclusive authority to represent "Judaism", and which typically shunned social intercourse, especially marriage, with members of other sects. According to one theory, in the same period, the council of sages known as the Sanhedrin codified and canonized the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh), and, following the return from Babylon, the Torah was read publicly on market-days. Modern literary analysis suggests that it was at this time that older oral and written sources were revised to account for the exile as God's punishment for the sin of worshipping other gods.[13]
The Temple was no longer the only institution for Jewish religious life. After the building of the Second Temple in the time of Ezra the Scribe, the houses of study and worship remained important secondary institutions in Jewish life. Outside of Judea, the synagogue was often called a house of prayer. While most Jews could not regularly attend the Temple service, they could meet at the synagogue for morning, afternoon and evening prayers. On Mondays, Thursdays and the Sabbath, a weekly Torah portion was read publicly in the synagogues, following the tradition of public Torah readings instituted by Ezra.[14]
Although priests controlled the rituals of the Temple, the scribes and sages,[disambiguation needed] later called rabbis (Heb.: "my master") dominated the study of the Torah. These sages identified with the Prophets and developed and maintained an oral tradition that they believed had originated at Mount Sinai alongside the Holy Writ. The Pharisees had its origins in this new group of authorities.
According to the Hebrew Bible, the first significant return of exiles commenced with Ezra, who assembled at the river Ahava all those who wanted to return. These consisted of about 1,800 men, or 5,500 to 6,000 people (Ezra 8), besides 38 Levites and 220 slaves of the Temple from Casiphia. With this body, which was invested with royal powers, Ezra and Nehemiah succeeded, after great difficulties, in establishing the post-exilic Jewish community. From the list given in Nehemiah 7:6-72 (which parallels Ezra 2), which the chronicler supposed to be an enumeration of those who had returned under Cyrus, it appears that the whole Jewish community at this time comprised 42,360 men, or 125,000 to 130,000 people.[15]
This period saw the last high-point of Biblical prophecy in the person of Ezekiel, followed by the emergence of the central role of the Torah in Jewish life.[16] This process coincided with the emergence of scribes and sages as Jewish leaders (see Ezra and the Pharisees).
Hellenistic Judaism[edit]
Main article: Hellenistic Judaism
The Hellenistic period of Jewish history began with the conquests of Alexander the Great who died in 323 BCE. The rift between the priests and the sages developed at this time, when Jews faced new political and cultural struggles. After Alexander’s death his empire was divided among his generals. Henceforth, until the coming of the Romans (Pompey) in 63 BCE, the Land of Israel was to be ruled by the Ptolemaic and Seleucid kings in alternating succession. It was during this period that Judaism suffered strife and war to determine its ultimate relation to Hellenism. A small minority had sought to gain control of the nation and to impose extreme Hellenism on the people. This would have meant the abandonment of the Torah as the national constitution and the norm of Jewish life. In its stead would have been the Hellenic cosmopolitan ideal and the Greek city-state, the polis. When intermittent civil war over this issue began, Antiochus Epiphanes, the Seleucid ruler, reacted by supporting the Hellenists. His tactic was to outlaw Jewish practice and then mandate extreme Hellenization. It was against this policy that the Maccabees rose in revolt (167–164 BCE).
Late Second Temple Period[edit]
The Late Second Temple Period (c. 200 BCE to 70 CE) was a period of intense social changes for the Jewish people.
Maccabees[edit]
Main article: Maccabees
First led by Mattathias of the priestly Hasmonean family and then by his son Judah the Maccabee, the Jews subsequently entered Jerusalem and purified the Temple (164 BCE), events commemorated each year by the festival of Hanukkah.
Following further Hasmonean victories (147 BCE), the Seleucids restored autonomy to Judea, as the Land of Israel was now called, and, with the collapse of the Seleucid kingdom (129 BCE), Jewish independence was achieved. Under the Hasmonean Dynasty, which lasted about 80 years, the kingdom regained boundaries not far short of Solomon’s realm, political consolidation under Jewish rule was attained, and Jewish life flourished.
Pompey's siege of Jerusalem in 63 BCE[edit]
Main article: Siege of Jerusalem (63 BC)
The Siege of Jerusalem in 63 BCE occurred during Pompey the Great's campaigns in the east, shortly after his successful conclusion of the Third Mithridatic War. Pompey had been asked to intervene in an internecine war between Hyrcanus II and Aristobulus II for the throne of the Hasmonean Kingdom. His conquest of Jerusalem, however, spelled the end of Jewish independence and the incorporation of Judea into the Roman Republic as a client kingdom.
Roman Province of Judea[edit]
Main article: Judea (Roman province)
In 6 CE, Rome formed Judea proper, Samaria, and Idumea into one province governed by prefects and later procurators which historians refer to as Iudaea province.
Jewish sects[edit]
In Antiquities of the Jews, Flavius Josephus describes four major sects: Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, and Zealots (of which the Sicarii are considered a subgroup). Josephus divides those sects into three groups: Philosophical (religious), nationalist, and criminal.[17] Of the five sects described by Josephus, the first three are more religious than political:
The Sadducees were priestly and aristocratic families who interpreted the law more literally than the Pharisees. They dominated the Temple worship and its rites, including the sacrificial cult.
Unlike the Sadducees, the Pharisees believed in the divinity and validity of the oral as well as the written law. They were flexible in their interpretations and willing to adapt the law to changing circumstances. By the first century CE, the Pharisees came to represent the beliefs and practices of the majority of Judean Jewry.
The Essenes were a separatist group, some of whom formed an ascetic monastic community and retreated to the wilderness of Judea. They shared material possessions and occupied themselves with disciplined study, worship, and work. They practiced ritual immersion and ate their meals communally.
The Sicarii and the Zealots were groups of extreme nationalists that Josephus characterized as political or criminal factions:
The Sicarii, were what Josephus characterized as a "Fourth Philosophy" [18]
The Zealots were a "fourth sect", founded by Judas of Galilee and Zadok the Pharisee in the year 6 against Quirinius' tax reform, shortly after the Roman state declared (what had most recently been the territory of Herod Archelaus) a Roman Province, and that they "agree in all other things with the Pharisaic notions; but they have an inviolable attachment to liberty, and say that God is to be their only Ruler and Lord." [19]
Hillel and Shammai[edit]
Main article: Hillel the Elder
See also: Hillel and Shammai
Hillel the Elder[20] in Jerusalem was one of the most important figures in Jewish history. He is associated with the development of the Talmud. Renowned within Judaism as a sage and scholar, he was the founder of the House of Hillel school for Tannaïm (Sages of the Mishnah) and the founder of a dynasty of Sages who stood at the head of the Jews living in the land of Israel until roughly the fifth century of the Christian Era.
Shammai was the most eminent contemporary and the halakhic opponent of Hillel, and is almost invariably mentioned along with him. Shammai founded a school of his own, known as the House of Shammai, which differed fundamentally from that of Hillel, though both were Pharisees.
Messianic movements[edit]
Further information: Jewish Christians and Split of early Christianity and Judaism
Further information: Jewish messianism and Messiah ben Joseph
Jewish messianism has its root in the apocalyptic literature of the 2nd century BC to 1st century BC, promising a future "anointed" leader or Messiah to resurrect the Israelite "Kingdom of God", in place of the foreign rulers of the time. This corresponded with the Maccabean Revolt directed against the Seleucids. Following the fall of the Hasmonean kingdom, it was directed against the Roman administration of Iudaea Province, which, according to Josephus, began with the formation of the Zealots during the Census of Quirinius of 6 AD, though full scale open revolt did not occur until the First Jewish–Roman War in 66 AD. Historian H. H. Ben-Sasson has proposed that the "Crisis under Caligula" (37-41) was the "first open break between Rome and the Jews", even though problems were already evident during the Census of Quirinius in 6 and under Sejanus (before 31).[21]
Judaism is known to allow for multiple messiahs, the two most relevant are Messiah ben Joseph and the traditional Messiah ben David. Some scholars have argued to varying degrees that Christianity and Judaism did not separate as suddenly or as dramatically as sometimes thought and that the idea of two messiahs, one suffering and the second fulfilling the traditional messianic role, was normative to ancient Judaism, and in fact predated Jesus.[22][23][24][25] Alan Segal has written that "one can speak of a 'twin birth' of two new Judaisms, both markedly different from the religious systems that preceded them. Not only were rabbinic Judaism and Christianity religious twins, but, like Jacob and Esau, the twin sons of Isaac and Rebecca, they fought in the womb, setting the stage for life after the womb."[26]
The first Christians (the disciples or students of Jesus) were essentially all ethnically Jewish or Jewish proselytes. In other words, Jesus was Jewish, preached to the Jewish people and called from them his first disciples. Jewish Christians regarded "Christianity" as an affirmation of every aspect of contemporary Judaism, with the addition of one extra belief — that Jesus was the Messiah.[27] The doctrines of the apostles of Jesus brought the Early Church into conflict with some Jewish religious authorities (Acts records dispute over resurrection of the dead which was rejected by the Sadducees, see also Persecution of Christians in the New Testament), and possibly later led to Christians' expulsion from synagogues (see Council of Jamnia for other theories). While Marcionism rejected all Jewish influence on Christianity, Proto-orthodox Christianity instead retained some of the doctrines and practices of 1st-century Judaism while rejecting others, see the Historical background to the issue of Biblical law in Christianity and Early Christianity. They held the Jewish scriptures to be authoritative and sacred, employing mostly the Septuagint or Targum translations, and adding other texts as the New Testament canon developed. Christian baptism was another continuation of a Judaic practice.[28]
According to many historians, most of Jesus' teachings were intelligible and acceptable in terms of Second Temple Judaism; what set Christians apart from Jews was their faith in Christ as the resurrected messiah.[29] Recent work by historians paints a more complex portrait of late Second Temple Judaism and early Christianity. Some historians have suggested that, before his death, Jesus created amongst his believers such certainty that the Kingdom of God and the resurrection of the dead was at hand, that with few exceptions (John 20: 24-29) when they saw him shortly after his execution, they had no doubt that he had been resurrected, and that the restoration of the Kingdom and resurrecton of the dead was at hand. These specific beliefs were compatible with Second Temple Judaism.[30] In the following years the restoration of the Kingdom, as Jews expected it, failed to occur. Some Christians began to believe instead that Christ, rather than simply being the Jewish messiah, was God made flesh, who died for the sins of humanity, marking the beginning of Christology.[31]
Jewish-Roman wars[edit]
Main article: Jewish-Roman wars
The Jewish-Roman wars were a series of revolts by the Jews of Iudaea Province against the Roman Empire. Some sources use the term to refer only to the First Jewish-Roman War (66–73) and Bar Kokhba revolt (132-135). Other sources include the Kitos War (115–117) as one of the Jewish-Roman wars; however this revolt started in Cyrenaica, and merely its final stages were actually fought in Iudaea Province.
First Jewish-Roman War (66–73) — also called the First Jewish Revolt or the Great Jewish Revolt.
Kitos War (115–117) — sometimes called the Second Jewish-Roman War.
Bar Kokhba revolt (132–135) — also called the Second Jewish-Roman War (when Kitos War is not counted), or the Third (when the Kitos War is counted).
After the destruction of the Temple, Jews were deprived of a central place of worship and religious activity, were unable to fulfill the temple-related practices mandated in the Torah, and were scattered around the world. More specifically, just before the first war broke out, the Sanhedrin was relocated to Jamnia, after 70 they were required to pay the Fiscus Judaicus if they wanted to practice their religion in the Roman Empire, and after 135 they were excluded from Jerusalem, except for the day of Tisha B'av, see Anti-Judaism in the pre-Christian Roman Empire for details.
Attempt to rebuild the Temple[edit]
Main article: Third Temple
In 363, not long before the Emperor Julian left Antioch to launch his campaign against Persia, in keeping with his effort to foster religions other than Christianity, he ordered the Temple rebuilt.[32] A personal friend of his, Ammianus Marcellinus, wrote this about the effort:

Julian thought to rebuild at an extravagant expense the proud Temple once at Jerusalem, and committed this task to Alypius of Antioch. Alypius set vigorously to work, and was seconded by the governor of the province; when fearful balls of fire, breaking out near the foundations, continued their attacks, till the workmen, after repeated scorchings, could approach no more: and he gave up the attempt.[citation needed]
—Ammianus Marcellinus
The failure to rebuild the Temple has been ascribed to the Galilee earthquake of 363, and to the Jews' ambivalence about the project. Sabotage is a possibility, as is an accidental fire. Divine intervention was the common view among Christian historians of the time.[33] Julian's support of Jews, coming after the hostility of many earlier Emperors, meant that Jews called him Julian the Hellene.[34]
See also[edit]
Intertestamental period
References[edit]
1.Jump up ^ The Oxford History of the Biblical World, ed. by Michael D Coogan. Pub. by Oxford University Press, 1999. pg 350
2.Jump up ^ Jeremiah 52:28-30
3.Jump up ^ John Bright A History of Israel
4.Jump up ^ Martin Noth The History of Israel
5.Jump up ^ A Psychoanalytic History of the Jews - Avner Falk - Google Books. Books.google.co.uk. Retrieved 18 September 2013.
6.Jump up ^ Reinstating the Divine Woman in Judaism - Jenny Kien - Google Books. Books.google.co.uk. Retrieved 18 September 2013.
7.Jump up ^ Ephraim Urbach The Sages
8.Jump up ^ "Alternative Tourism Group - Palestine". Atg.ps. 23 May 2012. Retrieved 18 September 2013.
9.Jump up ^ "Timeline of Judaism after the Babylonian Exile (538 BCE-70 CE)". Jewishvirtuallibrary.org. Retrieved 18 September 2013.
10.Jump up ^ http://www.biu.ac.il/js/rennert/history_4.html
11.Jump up ^ [1][dead link]
12.Jump up ^ Nehemiah 7:6-66 and Ezra 2:64
13.Jump up ^ Encyclopedia of the Peoples of Africa and the Middle East - Facts On File, Incorporated - Google Books. Books.google.co.uk. Retrieved 2013-09-18.
14.Jump up ^ See Nehemiah 8:1-18.
15.Jump up ^ Gottheil et al., "Babylonian Captivity". Retrieved 2007-11-08. JewishEncyclopedia.com
16.Jump up ^ According to historical-critical scholars, it was edited and redacted during this time, and saw the beginning of the canonization of the Bible, which provided a central text for Jews.
17.Jump up ^ Flavius Josephus. Jewish Antiquities book 18
18.Jump up ^ Flavius Josephus. Jewish Antiquities (18.12-25)
19.Jump up ^ Flavius Josephus. Jewish Antiquities (18.1.6)
20.Jump up ^ Jewish Encyclopedia: Hillel: "His activity of forty years is perhaps historical; and since it began, according to a trustworthy tradition (Shab. 15a), one hundred years before the destruction of Jerusalem, it must have covered the period 30 B.C.E. -10 C.E."
21.Jump up ^ H.H. Ben-Sasson, A History of the Jewish People, Harvard University Press, 1976, ISBN 0-674-39731-2, The Crisis Under Gaius Caligula, pages 254-256: "The reign of Gaius Caligula (37-41) witnessed the first open break between the Jews and the Julio-Claudian empire. Until then — if one accepts Sejanus' heyday and the trouble caused by the census after Archelaus's banishment — there was usually an atmosphere of understanding between the Jews and the empire ... These relations deteriorated seriously during Caligula's reign, and, though after his death the peace was outwardly re-established, considerable bitterness remained on both sides. ... Caligula ordered that a golden statue of himself be set up in the Temple in Jerusalem. ... Only Caligula's death, at the hands of Roman conspirators (41), prevented the outbreak of a Jewish-Roman war that might well have spread to the entire East."
22.Jump up ^ Daniel Boyarin (2012). The Jewish Gospels: The Story of the Jewish Christ. New Press. Retrieved 20 January 2014.
23.Jump up ^ Israel Knohl (2000). The Messiah Before Jesus: The Suffering Servant of the Dead Sea Scrolls. University of California Press. Retrieved 20 January 2014.
24.Jump up ^ Alan J. Avery-Peck, ed. (2005). The Review of Rabbinic Judaism: Ancient, Medieval, and Modern. Martinus Nijhoff Publishers. pp. 91–112. Retrieved 20 January 2014.
25.Jump up ^ Peter Schäfer (2012). The Jewish Jesus: How Judaism and Christianity Shaped Each Other. Princeton University Press. pp. 235–238. Retrieved 20 January 2014.
26.Jump up ^ Alan F. Segal, Rebecca's Children: Judaism and Christianity in the Roman World, Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1986.
27.Jump up ^ McGrath, Alister E., Christianity: An Introduction. Blackwell Publishing (2006). ISBN 1-4051-0899-1. Page 174: "In effect, they Jewish Christians seemed to regard Christianity as an affirmation of every aspect of contemporary Judaism, with the addition of one extra belief — that Jesus was the Messiah. Unless males were circumcised, they could not be saved (Acts 15:1)."
28.Jump up ^ Jewish Encyclopedia: Baptism: "According to rabbinical teachings, which dominated even during the existence of the Temple (Pes. viii. 8), Baptism, next to circumcision and sacrifice, was an absolutely necessary condition to be fulfilled by a proselyte to Judaism (Yeb. 46b, 47b; Ker. 9a; 'Ab. Zarah 57a; Shab. 135a; Yer. Kid. iii. 14, 64d). Circumcision, however, was much more important, and, like baptism, was called a "seal" (Schlatter, "Die Kirche Jerusalems," 1898, p. 70).
29.Jump up ^ Shaye J.D. Cohen 1987 From the Maccabees to the Mishnah Library of Early Christianity, Wayne Meeks, editor. The Westminster Press. 167-168
30.Jump up ^ Paula Fredricksen, From Jesus to Christ Yale university Press. pp. 133-134
31.Jump up ^ Paula Fredricksen, From Jesus to Christ Yale university Press. pp. 136-142
32.Jump up ^ Ammianus Marcellinus, Res Gestae, 23.1.2–3.
33.Jump up ^ See "Julian and the Jews 361–363 CE" and "Julian the Apostate and the Holy Temple".
34.Jump up ^ A Psychoanalytic History of the Jews, Avner Falk
  


Categories: Ancient Jewish Greek history
Ancient Jewish Persian history
Jewish history
Jews and Judaism in the Roman Empire
Second Temple













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 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Temple_Judaism









Second Temple Judaism

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jump to: navigation, search

Second Temple Judaism refers to the religion of Judaism during the Second Temple period, between the construction of the second Jewish temple in Jerusalem in 515 BCE, and its destruction by the Romans in 70 CE. This period witnessed major historical upheavals and significant religious changes that would affect not only Judaism but also Christianity (which calls it the Intertestamental period). The origins of the authority of scripture, of the centrality of law and morality in religion, of the synagogue and of apocalyptic expectations for the future all developed in the Judaism of this period.


Contents  [hide]
1 Sources
2 History 2.1 Babylonian captivity
2.2 Return from Babylonian captivity
2.3 Hellenistic Judaism
3 Late Second Temple Period 3.1 Maccabees
3.2 Pompey's siege of Jerusalem in 63 BCE
3.3 Roman Province of Judea
3.4 Jewish sects
3.5 Hillel and Shammai
3.6 Messianic movements
3.7 Jewish-Roman wars
4 Attempt to rebuild the Temple
5 See also
6 References

Sources[edit]
The primary literary sources for information about Second Temple Judaism are Ezra-Nehemiah, the Books of the Maccabees and other Biblical Apocrypha, the Dead Sea Scrolls, Old Testament pseudepigrapha, the works of Josephus and Philo, the Mishnah, and the New Testament and New Testament Apocrypha.
History[edit]
Babylonian captivity[edit]
Main article: Babylonian captivity
The deportation and exile of Jews of the ancient Kingdom of Judah to Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar II, starting with the first deportation in 597 BCE[1] and continuing after the fall of Jerusalem and destruction of the Temple in 587 BCE,[2] resulted in dramatic changes to Jewish culture and religion. During the 70-year exile in Babylon, Jewish houses of assembly (known in Hebrew as a "beit knesset" or in Greek as a "synagogue") and houses of prayer (Greek: προσευχαί, proseuchai; Hebrew Beit Tefilah), were the primary meeting places for prayer, and the house of study ("beit midrash") was the counterpart for the synagogue.
During the period of captivity, Jews continued to practice and develop their religious traditions, many of which became distinct from their origins, due to the influences of the local culture, and religion.
The Babylonian captivity had a number of consequences for Judaism and the Jewish culture, including changes to the Hebrew alphabet and changes in the fundamental practices and customs of the Jewish religion. Many[who?] suggest the people of Israel were henotheists during the First Temple period, believing each nation had its own god but that theirs was superior.[3][4] Others suggest the people of Israel and Judah were polytheists,[5] citing for example the presence of an asherah in the Temple.[6] Some suggest that strict monotheism developed during the Babylonian Exile, perhaps in reaction to Zoroastrian dualism.[7]
Return from Babylonian captivity[edit]


 This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (November 2008)
After the overthrow of Babylonia by the Persian Empire in 538 BCE,[8] the Persian Cyrus the Great gave Jews permission to return to Judea,[9][10][11] and more than 40,000 are said to have returned according to the Biblical accounts of Jehoiakim, Ezra, and Nehemiah.[12]
Cyrus did not, however, allow the restoration of the Judean monarchy, which left the Judean priests as the dominant authority. Without the constraining power of the monarchy, the authority of the Temple in civic life was amplified. It was around this time that the Sadducee party emerged as the party of priests and allied elites. However, the Second Temple (completed 515 BCE) had been constructed under the auspices of a foreign power, and there were lingering questions about its legitimacy. This provided the condition for the development of various sects or "schools of thought", each of which claimed exclusive authority to represent "Judaism", and which typically shunned social intercourse, especially marriage, with members of other sects. According to one theory, in the same period, the council of sages known as the Sanhedrin codified and canonized the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh), and, following the return from Babylon, the Torah was read publicly on market-days. Modern literary analysis suggests that it was at this time that older oral and written sources were revised to account for the exile as God's punishment for the sin of worshipping other gods.[13]
The Temple was no longer the only institution for Jewish religious life. After the building of the Second Temple in the time of Ezra the Scribe, the houses of study and worship remained important secondary institutions in Jewish life. Outside of Judea, the synagogue was often called a house of prayer. While most Jews could not regularly attend the Temple service, they could meet at the synagogue for morning, afternoon and evening prayers. On Mondays, Thursdays and the Sabbath, a weekly Torah portion was read publicly in the synagogues, following the tradition of public Torah readings instituted by Ezra.[14]
Although priests controlled the rituals of the Temple, the scribes and sages,[disambiguation needed] later called rabbis (Heb.: "my master") dominated the study of the Torah. These sages identified with the Prophets and developed and maintained an oral tradition that they believed had originated at Mount Sinai alongside the Holy Writ. The Pharisees had its origins in this new group of authorities.
According to the Hebrew Bible, the first significant return of exiles commenced with Ezra, who assembled at the river Ahava all those who wanted to return. These consisted of about 1,800 men, or 5,500 to 6,000 people (Ezra 8), besides 38 Levites and 220 slaves of the Temple from Casiphia. With this body, which was invested with royal powers, Ezra and Nehemiah succeeded, after great difficulties, in establishing the post-exilic Jewish community. From the list given in Nehemiah 7:6-72 (which parallels Ezra 2), which the chronicler supposed to be an enumeration of those who had returned under Cyrus, it appears that the whole Jewish community at this time comprised 42,360 men, or 125,000 to 130,000 people.[15]
This period saw the last high-point of Biblical prophecy in the person of Ezekiel, followed by the emergence of the central role of the Torah in Jewish life.[16] This process coincided with the emergence of scribes and sages as Jewish leaders (see Ezra and the Pharisees).
Hellenistic Judaism[edit]
Main article: Hellenistic Judaism
The Hellenistic period of Jewish history began with the conquests of Alexander the Great who died in 323 BCE. The rift between the priests and the sages developed at this time, when Jews faced new political and cultural struggles. After Alexander’s death his empire was divided among his generals. Henceforth, until the coming of the Romans (Pompey) in 63 BCE, the Land of Israel was to be ruled by the Ptolemaic and Seleucid kings in alternating succession. It was during this period that Judaism suffered strife and war to determine its ultimate relation to Hellenism. A small minority had sought to gain control of the nation and to impose extreme Hellenism on the people. This would have meant the abandonment of the Torah as the national constitution and the norm of Jewish life. In its stead would have been the Hellenic cosmopolitan ideal and the Greek city-state, the polis. When intermittent civil war over this issue began, Antiochus Epiphanes, the Seleucid ruler, reacted by supporting the Hellenists. His tactic was to outlaw Jewish practice and then mandate extreme Hellenization. It was against this policy that the Maccabees rose in revolt (167–164 BCE).
Late Second Temple Period[edit]
The Late Second Temple Period (c. 200 BCE to 70 CE) was a period of intense social changes for the Jewish people.
Maccabees[edit]
Main article: Maccabees
First led by Mattathias of the priestly Hasmonean family and then by his son Judah the Maccabee, the Jews subsequently entered Jerusalem and purified the Temple (164 BCE), events commemorated each year by the festival of Hanukkah.
Following further Hasmonean victories (147 BCE), the Seleucids restored autonomy to Judea, as the Land of Israel was now called, and, with the collapse of the Seleucid kingdom (129 BCE), Jewish independence was achieved. Under the Hasmonean Dynasty, which lasted about 80 years, the kingdom regained boundaries not far short of Solomon’s realm, political consolidation under Jewish rule was attained, and Jewish life flourished.
Pompey's siege of Jerusalem in 63 BCE[edit]
Main article: Siege of Jerusalem (63 BC)
The Siege of Jerusalem in 63 BCE occurred during Pompey the Great's campaigns in the east, shortly after his successful conclusion of the Third Mithridatic War. Pompey had been asked to intervene in an internecine war between Hyrcanus II and Aristobulus II for the throne of the Hasmonean Kingdom. His conquest of Jerusalem, however, spelled the end of Jewish independence and the incorporation of Judea into the Roman Republic as a client kingdom.
Roman Province of Judea[edit]
Main article: Judea (Roman province)
In 6 CE, Rome formed Judea proper, Samaria, and Idumea into one province governed by prefects and later procurators which historians refer to as Iudaea province.
Jewish sects[edit]
In Antiquities of the Jews, Flavius Josephus describes four major sects: Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, and Zealots (of which the Sicarii are considered a subgroup). Josephus divides those sects into three groups: Philosophical (religious), nationalist, and criminal.[17] Of the five sects described by Josephus, the first three are more religious than political:
The Sadducees were priestly and aristocratic families who interpreted the law more literally than the Pharisees. They dominated the Temple worship and its rites, including the sacrificial cult.
Unlike the Sadducees, the Pharisees believed in the divinity and validity of the oral as well as the written law. They were flexible in their interpretations and willing to adapt the law to changing circumstances. By the first century CE, the Pharisees came to represent the beliefs and practices of the majority of Judean Jewry.
The Essenes were a separatist group, some of whom formed an ascetic monastic community and retreated to the wilderness of Judea. They shared material possessions and occupied themselves with disciplined study, worship, and work. They practiced ritual immersion and ate their meals communally.
The Sicarii and the Zealots were groups of extreme nationalists that Josephus characterized as political or criminal factions:
The Sicarii, were what Josephus characterized as a "Fourth Philosophy" [18]
The Zealots were a "fourth sect", founded by Judas of Galilee and Zadok the Pharisee in the year 6 against Quirinius' tax reform, shortly after the Roman state declared (what had most recently been the territory of Herod Archelaus) a Roman Province, and that they "agree in all other things with the Pharisaic notions; but they have an inviolable attachment to liberty, and say that God is to be their only Ruler and Lord." [19]
Hillel and Shammai[edit]
Main article: Hillel the Elder
See also: Hillel and Shammai
Hillel the Elder[20] in Jerusalem was one of the most important figures in Jewish history. He is associated with the development of the Talmud. Renowned within Judaism as a sage and scholar, he was the founder of the House of Hillel school for Tannaïm (Sages of the Mishnah) and the founder of a dynasty of Sages who stood at the head of the Jews living in the land of Israel until roughly the fifth century of the Christian Era.
Shammai was the most eminent contemporary and the halakhic opponent of Hillel, and is almost invariably mentioned along with him. Shammai founded a school of his own, known as the House of Shammai, which differed fundamentally from that of Hillel, though both were Pharisees.
Messianic movements[edit]
Further information: Jewish Christians and Split of early Christianity and Judaism
Further information: Jewish messianism and Messiah ben Joseph
Jewish messianism has its root in the apocalyptic literature of the 2nd century BC to 1st century BC, promising a future "anointed" leader or Messiah to resurrect the Israelite "Kingdom of God", in place of the foreign rulers of the time. This corresponded with the Maccabean Revolt directed against the Seleucids. Following the fall of the Hasmonean kingdom, it was directed against the Roman administration of Iudaea Province, which, according to Josephus, began with the formation of the Zealots during the Census of Quirinius of 6 AD, though full scale open revolt did not occur until the First Jewish–Roman War in 66 AD. Historian H. H. Ben-Sasson has proposed that the "Crisis under Caligula" (37-41) was the "first open break between Rome and the Jews", even though problems were already evident during the Census of Quirinius in 6 and under Sejanus (before 31).[21]
Judaism is known to allow for multiple messiahs, the two most relevant are Messiah ben Joseph and the traditional Messiah ben David. Some scholars have argued to varying degrees that Christianity and Judaism did not separate as suddenly or as dramatically as sometimes thought and that the idea of two messiahs, one suffering and the second fulfilling the traditional messianic role, was normative to ancient Judaism, and in fact predated Jesus.[22][23][24][25] Alan Segal has written that "one can speak of a 'twin birth' of two new Judaisms, both markedly different from the religious systems that preceded them. Not only were rabbinic Judaism and Christianity religious twins, but, like Jacob and Esau, the twin sons of Isaac and Rebecca, they fought in the womb, setting the stage for life after the womb."[26]
The first Christians (the disciples or students of Jesus) were essentially all ethnically Jewish or Jewish proselytes. In other words, Jesus was Jewish, preached to the Jewish people and called from them his first disciples. Jewish Christians regarded "Christianity" as an affirmation of every aspect of contemporary Judaism, with the addition of one extra belief — that Jesus was the Messiah.[27] The doctrines of the apostles of Jesus brought the Early Church into conflict with some Jewish religious authorities (Acts records dispute over resurrection of the dead which was rejected by the Sadducees, see also Persecution of Christians in the New Testament), and possibly later led to Christians' expulsion from synagogues (see Council of Jamnia for other theories). While Marcionism rejected all Jewish influence on Christianity, Proto-orthodox Christianity instead retained some of the doctrines and practices of 1st-century Judaism while rejecting others, see the Historical background to the issue of Biblical law in Christianity and Early Christianity. They held the Jewish scriptures to be authoritative and sacred, employing mostly the Septuagint or Targum translations, and adding other texts as the New Testament canon developed. Christian baptism was another continuation of a Judaic practice.[28]
According to many historians, most of Jesus' teachings were intelligible and acceptable in terms of Second Temple Judaism; what set Christians apart from Jews was their faith in Christ as the resurrected messiah.[29] Recent work by historians paints a more complex portrait of late Second Temple Judaism and early Christianity. Some historians have suggested that, before his death, Jesus created amongst his believers such certainty that the Kingdom of God and the resurrection of the dead was at hand, that with few exceptions (John 20: 24-29) when they saw him shortly after his execution, they had no doubt that he had been resurrected, and that the restoration of the Kingdom and resurrecton of the dead was at hand. These specific beliefs were compatible with Second Temple Judaism.[30] In the following years the restoration of the Kingdom, as Jews expected it, failed to occur. Some Christians began to believe instead that Christ, rather than simply being the Jewish messiah, was God made flesh, who died for the sins of humanity, marking the beginning of Christology.[31]
Jewish-Roman wars[edit]
Main article: Jewish-Roman wars
The Jewish-Roman wars were a series of revolts by the Jews of Iudaea Province against the Roman Empire. Some sources use the term to refer only to the First Jewish-Roman War (66–73) and Bar Kokhba revolt (132-135). Other sources include the Kitos War (115–117) as one of the Jewish-Roman wars; however this revolt started in Cyrenaica, and merely its final stages were actually fought in Iudaea Province.
First Jewish-Roman War (66–73) — also called the First Jewish Revolt or the Great Jewish Revolt.
Kitos War (115–117) — sometimes called the Second Jewish-Roman War.
Bar Kokhba revolt (132–135) — also called the Second Jewish-Roman War (when Kitos War is not counted), or the Third (when the Kitos War is counted).
After the destruction of the Temple, Jews were deprived of a central place of worship and religious activity, were unable to fulfill the temple-related practices mandated in the Torah, and were scattered around the world. More specifically, just before the first war broke out, the Sanhedrin was relocated to Jamnia, after 70 they were required to pay the Fiscus Judaicus if they wanted to practice their religion in the Roman Empire, and after 135 they were excluded from Jerusalem, except for the day of Tisha B'av, see Anti-Judaism in the pre-Christian Roman Empire for details.
Attempt to rebuild the Temple[edit]
Main article: Third Temple
In 363, not long before the Emperor Julian left Antioch to launch his campaign against Persia, in keeping with his effort to foster religions other than Christianity, he ordered the Temple rebuilt.[32] A personal friend of his, Ammianus Marcellinus, wrote this about the effort:

Julian thought to rebuild at an extravagant expense the proud Temple once at Jerusalem, and committed this task to Alypius of Antioch. Alypius set vigorously to work, and was seconded by the governor of the province; when fearful balls of fire, breaking out near the foundations, continued their attacks, till the workmen, after repeated scorchings, could approach no more: and he gave up the attempt.[citation needed]
—Ammianus Marcellinus
The failure to rebuild the Temple has been ascribed to the Galilee earthquake of 363, and to the Jews' ambivalence about the project. Sabotage is a possibility, as is an accidental fire. Divine intervention was the common view among Christian historians of the time.[33] Julian's support of Jews, coming after the hostility of many earlier Emperors, meant that Jews called him Julian the Hellene.[34]
See also[edit]
Intertestamental period
References[edit]
1.Jump up ^ The Oxford History of the Biblical World, ed. by Michael D Coogan. Pub. by Oxford University Press, 1999. pg 350
2.Jump up ^ Jeremiah 52:28-30
3.Jump up ^ John Bright A History of Israel
4.Jump up ^ Martin Noth The History of Israel
5.Jump up ^ A Psychoanalytic History of the Jews - Avner Falk - Google Books. Books.google.co.uk. Retrieved 18 September 2013.
6.Jump up ^ Reinstating the Divine Woman in Judaism - Jenny Kien - Google Books. Books.google.co.uk. Retrieved 18 September 2013.
7.Jump up ^ Ephraim Urbach The Sages
8.Jump up ^ "Alternative Tourism Group - Palestine". Atg.ps. 23 May 2012. Retrieved 18 September 2013.
9.Jump up ^ "Timeline of Judaism after the Babylonian Exile (538 BCE-70 CE)". Jewishvirtuallibrary.org. Retrieved 18 September 2013.
10.Jump up ^ http://www.biu.ac.il/js/rennert/history_4.html
11.Jump up ^ [1][dead link]
12.Jump up ^ Nehemiah 7:6-66 and Ezra 2:64
13.Jump up ^ Encyclopedia of the Peoples of Africa and the Middle East - Facts On File, Incorporated - Google Books. Books.google.co.uk. Retrieved 2013-09-18.
14.Jump up ^ See Nehemiah 8:1-18.
15.Jump up ^ Gottheil et al., "Babylonian Captivity". Retrieved 2007-11-08. JewishEncyclopedia.com
16.Jump up ^ According to historical-critical scholars, it was edited and redacted during this time, and saw the beginning of the canonization of the Bible, which provided a central text for Jews.
17.Jump up ^ Flavius Josephus. Jewish Antiquities book 18
18.Jump up ^ Flavius Josephus. Jewish Antiquities (18.12-25)
19.Jump up ^ Flavius Josephus. Jewish Antiquities (18.1.6)
20.Jump up ^ Jewish Encyclopedia: Hillel: "His activity of forty years is perhaps historical; and since it began, according to a trustworthy tradition (Shab. 15a), one hundred years before the destruction of Jerusalem, it must have covered the period 30 B.C.E. -10 C.E."
21.Jump up ^ H.H. Ben-Sasson, A History of the Jewish People, Harvard University Press, 1976, ISBN 0-674-39731-2, The Crisis Under Gaius Caligula, pages 254-256: "The reign of Gaius Caligula (37-41) witnessed the first open break between the Jews and the Julio-Claudian empire. Until then — if one accepts Sejanus' heyday and the trouble caused by the census after Archelaus's banishment — there was usually an atmosphere of understanding between the Jews and the empire ... These relations deteriorated seriously during Caligula's reign, and, though after his death the peace was outwardly re-established, considerable bitterness remained on both sides. ... Caligula ordered that a golden statue of himself be set up in the Temple in Jerusalem. ... Only Caligula's death, at the hands of Roman conspirators (41), prevented the outbreak of a Jewish-Roman war that might well have spread to the entire East."
22.Jump up ^ Daniel Boyarin (2012). The Jewish Gospels: The Story of the Jewish Christ. New Press. Retrieved 20 January 2014.
23.Jump up ^ Israel Knohl (2000). The Messiah Before Jesus: The Suffering Servant of the Dead Sea Scrolls. University of California Press. Retrieved 20 January 2014.
24.Jump up ^ Alan J. Avery-Peck, ed. (2005). The Review of Rabbinic Judaism: Ancient, Medieval, and Modern. Martinus Nijhoff Publishers. pp. 91–112. Retrieved 20 January 2014.
25.Jump up ^ Peter Schäfer (2012). The Jewish Jesus: How Judaism and Christianity Shaped Each Other. Princeton University Press. pp. 235–238. Retrieved 20 January 2014.
26.Jump up ^ Alan F. Segal, Rebecca's Children: Judaism and Christianity in the Roman World, Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1986.
27.Jump up ^ McGrath, Alister E., Christianity: An Introduction. Blackwell Publishing (2006). ISBN 1-4051-0899-1. Page 174: "In effect, they Jewish Christians seemed to regard Christianity as an affirmation of every aspect of contemporary Judaism, with the addition of one extra belief — that Jesus was the Messiah. Unless males were circumcised, they could not be saved (Acts 15:1)."
28.Jump up ^ Jewish Encyclopedia: Baptism: "According to rabbinical teachings, which dominated even during the existence of the Temple (Pes. viii. 8), Baptism, next to circumcision and sacrifice, was an absolutely necessary condition to be fulfilled by a proselyte to Judaism (Yeb. 46b, 47b; Ker. 9a; 'Ab. Zarah 57a; Shab. 135a; Yer. Kid. iii. 14, 64d). Circumcision, however, was much more important, and, like baptism, was called a "seal" (Schlatter, "Die Kirche Jerusalems," 1898, p. 70).
29.Jump up ^ Shaye J.D. Cohen 1987 From the Maccabees to the Mishnah Library of Early Christianity, Wayne Meeks, editor. The Westminster Press. 167-168
30.Jump up ^ Paula Fredricksen, From Jesus to Christ Yale university Press. pp. 133-134
31.Jump up ^ Paula Fredricksen, From Jesus to Christ Yale university Press. pp. 136-142
32.Jump up ^ Ammianus Marcellinus, Res Gestae, 23.1.2–3.
33.Jump up ^ See "Julian and the Jews 361–363 CE" and "Julian the Apostate and the Holy Temple".
34.Jump up ^ A Psychoanalytic History of the Jews, Avner Falk
  


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Ancient Jewish Persian history
Jewish history
Jews and Judaism in the Roman Empire
Second Temple













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Second Temple period

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jump to: navigation, search

The Second Temple period in Jewish history lasted between 530 BC and 70 AD,[1] when the Second Temple of Jerusalem existed. The sects of Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, and Zealots were formed during this period. The Second Temple period ended with the First Jewish–Roman War and the Roman destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple.
After the death of the last Jewish Prophets of the antiquity and still under Persian rule, the leadership of the Jewish people was in the hands of five successive generations of zugot ("pairs of") leaders. They flourished first under the Persians (c. 539–c. 332 BC), then under the Greeks (c. 332-167 BC), then under an independent Hasmonean Kingdom (140-37 BC), and then under the Romans (63 BC-132 AD).
During this period, Second Temple Judaism can be seen as shaped by three major crises and their results, as various groups of Jews reacted to them differently. First came the destruction of the Kingdom of Judah in 587/6 BC, when the Judeans lost their independence, monarchy, holy city and First Temple and were mostly exiled to Babylon. They consequently faced a theological crisis involving the nature, power, and goodness of God and were also threatened culturally, racially, and ceremonially as they were thrown into proximity with other peoples and religious groups. The absence of recognized prophets later in the period left them without their version of divine guidance at a time when they felt most in need of support and direction.[2] The second crisis was the growing influence of Hellenism in Judaism, which culminated in the Maccabean Revolt of 167 BC. The third crisis was the Roman occupation of the region, beginning with Pompey and his sack of Jerusalem in 63 BC.[2] This included the appointment of Herod the Great as King of the Jews by the Roman Senate, the Herodian Kingdom of Judea comprising parts of what today are Israel, Palestinian Authority, Gaza Strip, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria.


Contents  [hide]
1 Construction of the Second Temple
2 Hellenistic era
3 Hasmonean era
4 Herodian Kingdom and Tetrarchy
5 Roman Judea
6 See also
7 References

Construction of the Second Temple[edit]



 Model of the Second Temple of Jerusalem, Israel Museum, Jerusalem
Construction of the Second Temple was completed under the leadership of the last three Jewish Prophets Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi with Persian approval and financing.



 The Trumpeting Place inscription, a stone (2.43x1 m) with Hebrew inscription "To the Trumpeting Place" excavated by Benjamin Mazar at the southern foot of the Temple Mount is believed to be a part of the Second Temple
Based on the biblical account, after the return from Babylonian captivity under Zerubbabel, arrangements were almost immediately made to reorganize the desolated Yehud Province after the demise of the Kingdom of Judah seventy years earlier. The body of pilgrims, forming a band of 42,360,[3] having completed the long and dreary journey of some four months, from the banks of the Euphrates to Jerusalem, were animated in all their proceedings by a strong religious impulse, and therefore one of their first concerns was to restore their ancient house of worship by rebuilding their destroyed Temple and reinstituting the sacrificial rituals known as the korbanot.
On the invitation of Zerubbabel, the governor, who showed them a remarkable example of liberality by contributing personally 1,000 golden darics, besides other gifts, the people poured their gifts into the sacred treasury with great enthusiasm.[4] First they erected and dedicated the altar of God on the exact spot where it had formerly stood, and they then cleared away the charred heaps of debris which occupied the site of the old temple; and in the second month of the second year (535 BC), amid great public excitement and rejoicing, the foundations of the Second Temple were laid. A wide interest was felt in this great movement, although it was regarded with mingled feelings by the spectators.[5][6]
The Samaritans made proposals for co-operation in the work. Zerubbabel and the elders, however, declined all such cooperation, feeling that the Jews must build the Temple without help. Immediately evil reports were spread regarding the Jews. According to Ezra 4:5, the Samaritans sought to "frustrate their purpose" and sent messengers to Ecbatana and Susa, with the result that the work was suspended.
Seven years later, Cyrus the Great, who allowed the Jews to return to their homeland and rebuild the Temple, died,[7] and was succeeded by his son Cambyses. On his death, the "false Smerdis", an imposter, occupied the throne for some seven or eight months, and then Darius I of Persia became king (522 BC). In the second year of this monarch the work of rebuilding the temple was resumed and carried forward to its completion,[8] under the stimulus of the earnest counsels and admonitions of the prophets Haggai and Zechariah. It was ready for consecration in the spring of 516 BC, more than twenty years after the return from captivity. The Temple was completed on the third day of the month Adar, in the sixth year of the reign of King Darius, amid great rejoicings on the part of all the people[9] although it was evident that the Jews were no longer an independent people, but were subject to a foreign power. The Book of Haggai includes a prediction[10] that the glory of the second temple would be greater than that of the first.
Hellenistic era[edit]
Main article: Hellenistic Judaism
In 332 BC the Persians were defeated by Alexander the Great. After his demise, and the division of Alexander's empire among his generals, the Seleucid Kingdom was formed.
During this time currents of Judaism were influenced by Hellenistic philosophy developed from the 3rd century BC, notably the Jewish diaspora in Alexandria, culminating in the compilation of the Septuagint. An important advocate of the symbiosis of Jewish theology and Hellenistic thought is Philo.
Hasmonean era[edit]
A deterioration of relations between hellenized Jews and religious Jews led the Seleucid king Antiochus IV Epiphanes to impose decrees banning certain Jewish religious rites and traditions. Consequently, the orthodox Jews revolted under the leadership of the Hasmonean family, (also known as the Maccabees). This revolt eventually led to the formation of an independent Judean kingdom, under the Hasmonaean Dynasty, which lasted from 165 to 37 BC. The Hasmonean Dynasty eventually disintegrated as a result of civil war between the sons of Salome Alexandra - Hyrcanus II and Aristobulus II. The people, who did not want to be governed by a king but by theocratic clergy, made appeals in this spirit to the Roman authorities. A Roman intervention in the civil war in Judea was then made, following Syrian campaign of conquest and annexation, led by Pompey. The pro-Parthian Hasmonean rival brother however soon brought Parthian support and the throne changed until Herod the Great established himself as a new pro-Roman king of Judea.
Herodian Kingdom and Tetrarchy[edit]
Main articles: Herodian Kingdom and Herodian Tetrarchy
Judean kingdom under Herod experienced a period of growth and expansion. As a close and loyal ally to the Romans, Herod extended his rule as far as Arabia, created ambitious projects of construction and renovated the Temple.
After Herod's death in 4 BC, the kingdom was partitioned to several parts to each of his three sons (initially four parts) - forming the Tetrarchy. The central part of the Tetrarchy was given to Herod Archelaus, including Judea proper, Idumea and Samaria. In 6 AD, the country fell into unrest, and the Herodian ruler of Judea was deposited in favor of forming a new Roman province - Roman Judea. Philip ruled Ituraea and Trachonitis until his death in 34 AD when he was succeeded as tetrarch by Herod Agrippa I, who had previously been ruler of Chalcis. Agrippa surrendered Chalis to his brother Herod and ruled in Philip’s stead. On the death of Herod Antipas in 39 AD Herod Agrippa became ruler of Galilee also, and in 41 AD, as a mark of favour by the emperor Claudius, succeeded the Roman prefect Marullus as ruler of Iudaea. With this acquisition, the Herodian Kingdom of the Jews was nominally re-established until 44 AD though there is no indication that status as the Roman province was suspended.
Roman Judea[edit]
Main article: Judea (Roman province)
The Roman province of Judaea extended over parts of the former regions of the Hasmonean and Herodian kingdoms. It was created in 6 ce with the Census of Quirinius and merged into Syria Palaestina after 135 ce.
See also[edit]
Archaeology of Israel
References[edit]
1.Jump up ^ Figures based purely upon scientific dating and the proclivity among some scholars to bypass Jewish sources. However, Jewish tradition avers that the Second Temple stood for only four-hundred and twenty years, i.e. from 352 BCE – 68 CE. See: Maimondes' Questions & Responsa, responsum # 389, Jerusalem 1960 (Hebrew)
2.^ Jump up to: a b The Jewish Backgrounds of the New Testament: Second Commonwealth Judaism in Recent Study, Wheaton College, Previously published in Archaeology of the Biblical World, 1/2 (1991), pp. 40-49.
3.Jump up ^ Ezra 2:65
4.Jump up ^ Ezra 2
5.Jump up ^ Haggai 2:3
6.Jump up ^ Zechariah 4:10
7.Jump up ^ 2 Chronicles 36:22-23
8.Jump up ^ Ezra 5:6-6:15
9.Jump up ^ Ezra 6:15,16
10.Jump up ^ Haggai 2:19
  


Categories: Ancient Jewish Greek history
Ancient Jewish history of Roman Republic and Roman Empire eras
Ancient Jewish Persian history
Second Temple


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 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Temple_period










Second Temple period

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jump to: navigation, search

The Second Temple period in Jewish history lasted between 530 BC and 70 AD,[1] when the Second Temple of Jerusalem existed. The sects of Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, and Zealots were formed during this period. The Second Temple period ended with the First Jewish–Roman War and the Roman destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple.
After the death of the last Jewish Prophets of the antiquity and still under Persian rule, the leadership of the Jewish people was in the hands of five successive generations of zugot ("pairs of") leaders. They flourished first under the Persians (c. 539–c. 332 BC), then under the Greeks (c. 332-167 BC), then under an independent Hasmonean Kingdom (140-37 BC), and then under the Romans (63 BC-132 AD).
During this period, Second Temple Judaism can be seen as shaped by three major crises and their results, as various groups of Jews reacted to them differently. First came the destruction of the Kingdom of Judah in 587/6 BC, when the Judeans lost their independence, monarchy, holy city and First Temple and were mostly exiled to Babylon. They consequently faced a theological crisis involving the nature, power, and goodness of God and were also threatened culturally, racially, and ceremonially as they were thrown into proximity with other peoples and religious groups. The absence of recognized prophets later in the period left them without their version of divine guidance at a time when they felt most in need of support and direction.[2] The second crisis was the growing influence of Hellenism in Judaism, which culminated in the Maccabean Revolt of 167 BC. The third crisis was the Roman occupation of the region, beginning with Pompey and his sack of Jerusalem in 63 BC.[2] This included the appointment of Herod the Great as King of the Jews by the Roman Senate, the Herodian Kingdom of Judea comprising parts of what today are Israel, Palestinian Authority, Gaza Strip, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria.


Contents  [hide]
1 Construction of the Second Temple
2 Hellenistic era
3 Hasmonean era
4 Herodian Kingdom and Tetrarchy
5 Roman Judea
6 See also
7 References

Construction of the Second Temple[edit]



 Model of the Second Temple of Jerusalem, Israel Museum, Jerusalem
Construction of the Second Temple was completed under the leadership of the last three Jewish Prophets Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi with Persian approval and financing.



 The Trumpeting Place inscription, a stone (2.43x1 m) with Hebrew inscription "To the Trumpeting Place" excavated by Benjamin Mazar at the southern foot of the Temple Mount is believed to be a part of the Second Temple
Based on the biblical account, after the return from Babylonian captivity under Zerubbabel, arrangements were almost immediately made to reorganize the desolated Yehud Province after the demise of the Kingdom of Judah seventy years earlier. The body of pilgrims, forming a band of 42,360,[3] having completed the long and dreary journey of some four months, from the banks of the Euphrates to Jerusalem, were animated in all their proceedings by a strong religious impulse, and therefore one of their first concerns was to restore their ancient house of worship by rebuilding their destroyed Temple and reinstituting the sacrificial rituals known as the korbanot.
On the invitation of Zerubbabel, the governor, who showed them a remarkable example of liberality by contributing personally 1,000 golden darics, besides other gifts, the people poured their gifts into the sacred treasury with great enthusiasm.[4] First they erected and dedicated the altar of God on the exact spot where it had formerly stood, and they then cleared away the charred heaps of debris which occupied the site of the old temple; and in the second month of the second year (535 BC), amid great public excitement and rejoicing, the foundations of the Second Temple were laid. A wide interest was felt in this great movement, although it was regarded with mingled feelings by the spectators.[5][6]
The Samaritans made proposals for co-operation in the work. Zerubbabel and the elders, however, declined all such cooperation, feeling that the Jews must build the Temple without help. Immediately evil reports were spread regarding the Jews. According to Ezra 4:5, the Samaritans sought to "frustrate their purpose" and sent messengers to Ecbatana and Susa, with the result that the work was suspended.
Seven years later, Cyrus the Great, who allowed the Jews to return to their homeland and rebuild the Temple, died,[7] and was succeeded by his son Cambyses. On his death, the "false Smerdis", an imposter, occupied the throne for some seven or eight months, and then Darius I of Persia became king (522 BC). In the second year of this monarch the work of rebuilding the temple was resumed and carried forward to its completion,[8] under the stimulus of the earnest counsels and admonitions of the prophets Haggai and Zechariah. It was ready for consecration in the spring of 516 BC, more than twenty years after the return from captivity. The Temple was completed on the third day of the month Adar, in the sixth year of the reign of King Darius, amid great rejoicings on the part of all the people[9] although it was evident that the Jews were no longer an independent people, but were subject to a foreign power. The Book of Haggai includes a prediction[10] that the glory of the second temple would be greater than that of the first.
Hellenistic era[edit]
Main article: Hellenistic Judaism
In 332 BC the Persians were defeated by Alexander the Great. After his demise, and the division of Alexander's empire among his generals, the Seleucid Kingdom was formed.
During this time currents of Judaism were influenced by Hellenistic philosophy developed from the 3rd century BC, notably the Jewish diaspora in Alexandria, culminating in the compilation of the Septuagint. An important advocate of the symbiosis of Jewish theology and Hellenistic thought is Philo.
Hasmonean era[edit]
A deterioration of relations between hellenized Jews and religious Jews led the Seleucid king Antiochus IV Epiphanes to impose decrees banning certain Jewish religious rites and traditions. Consequently, the orthodox Jews revolted under the leadership of the Hasmonean family, (also known as the Maccabees). This revolt eventually led to the formation of an independent Judean kingdom, under the Hasmonaean Dynasty, which lasted from 165 to 37 BC. The Hasmonean Dynasty eventually disintegrated as a result of civil war between the sons of Salome Alexandra - Hyrcanus II and Aristobulus II. The people, who did not want to be governed by a king but by theocratic clergy, made appeals in this spirit to the Roman authorities. A Roman intervention in the civil war in Judea was then made, following Syrian campaign of conquest and annexation, led by Pompey. The pro-Parthian Hasmonean rival brother however soon brought Parthian support and the throne changed until Herod the Great established himself as a new pro-Roman king of Judea.
Herodian Kingdom and Tetrarchy[edit]
Main articles: Herodian Kingdom and Herodian Tetrarchy
Judean kingdom under Herod experienced a period of growth and expansion. As a close and loyal ally to the Romans, Herod extended his rule as far as Arabia, created ambitious projects of construction and renovated the Temple.
After Herod's death in 4 BC, the kingdom was partitioned to several parts to each of his three sons (initially four parts) - forming the Tetrarchy. The central part of the Tetrarchy was given to Herod Archelaus, including Judea proper, Idumea and Samaria. In 6 AD, the country fell into unrest, and the Herodian ruler of Judea was deposited in favor of forming a new Roman province - Roman Judea. Philip ruled Ituraea and Trachonitis until his death in 34 AD when he was succeeded as tetrarch by Herod Agrippa I, who had previously been ruler of Chalcis. Agrippa surrendered Chalis to his brother Herod and ruled in Philip’s stead. On the death of Herod Antipas in 39 AD Herod Agrippa became ruler of Galilee also, and in 41 AD, as a mark of favour by the emperor Claudius, succeeded the Roman prefect Marullus as ruler of Iudaea. With this acquisition, the Herodian Kingdom of the Jews was nominally re-established until 44 AD though there is no indication that status as the Roman province was suspended.
Roman Judea[edit]
Main article: Judea (Roman province)
The Roman province of Judaea extended over parts of the former regions of the Hasmonean and Herodian kingdoms. It was created in 6 ce with the Census of Quirinius and merged into Syria Palaestina after 135 ce.
See also[edit]
Archaeology of Israel
References[edit]
1.Jump up ^ Figures based purely upon scientific dating and the proclivity among some scholars to bypass Jewish sources. However, Jewish tradition avers that the Second Temple stood for only four-hundred and twenty years, i.e. from 352 BCE – 68 CE. See: Maimondes' Questions & Responsa, responsum # 389, Jerusalem 1960 (Hebrew)
2.^ Jump up to: a b The Jewish Backgrounds of the New Testament: Second Commonwealth Judaism in Recent Study, Wheaton College, Previously published in Archaeology of the Biblical World, 1/2 (1991), pp. 40-49.
3.Jump up ^ Ezra 2:65
4.Jump up ^ Ezra 2
5.Jump up ^ Haggai 2:3
6.Jump up ^ Zechariah 4:10
7.Jump up ^ 2 Chronicles 36:22-23
8.Jump up ^ Ezra 5:6-6:15
9.Jump up ^ Ezra 6:15,16
10.Jump up ^ Haggai 2:19
  


Categories: Ancient Jewish Greek history
Ancient Jewish history of Roman Republic and Roman Empire eras
Ancient Jewish Persian history
Second Temple


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Siege of Jerusalem (AD 70)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
  (Redirected from Siege of Jerusalem (70))
Jump to: navigation, search


Siege of Jerusalem
Part of the First Jewish-Roman War
Map indicating progress of the Roman army during the siege
 Progress of the Roman army during the siege.

Date
February – August, AD 70
Location
Jerusalem, Judaea
31°46′41″N 35°14′9″ECoordinates: 31°46′41″N 35°14′9″E
Result
Roman victory
Main rebel Judean forces subdued.
Temple of Jerusalem destroyed.

Territorial
 changes
Roman rule of Jerusalem restored

Belligerents
Vexilloid of the Roman Empire Roman Empire
Judean Jews
Sadducees

Zealots
Idumeans

Commanders and leaders
Titus Simon Bar Giora
John of Gischala
Eleazar ben Simon

Strength
70,000 20,000 - 30,000 10,000
Casualties and losses
unknown 30,000 10,000
The Siege of Jerusalem in 70 AD was the decisive event of the First Jewish–Roman War. The Roman army, led by the future Emperor Titus, with Tiberius Julius Alexander as his second-in-command, besieged and conquered the city of Jerusalem, which had been occupied by its Jewish defenders in 66 AD.
The siege ended with the sacking of the city and the destruction of its famous Second Temple. The destruction of both the first and second temples is still mourned annually as the Jewish fast Tisha B'Av. The Arch of Titus, celebrating the Roman sack of Jerusalem and the Temple, still stands in Rome.


Contents  [hide]
1 Siege
2 Destruction of Jerusalem
3 Commemoration 3.1 Roman
3.2 Jewish
4 Perceptions
5 In later art
6 See also
7 References
8 External links

Siege[edit]


[show]
v ·
 t ·
 e
 
First Jewish–Roman War






































 This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (October 2010)
Despite early successes in repelling the Roman sieges, the Zealots fought amongst themselves, and they lacked proper leadership, resulting in poor discipline, training, and preparation for the battles that were to follow.
Titus surrounded the city, with three legions (V Macedonica, XII Fulminata, XV Apollinaris) on the western side and a fourth (X Fretensis) on the Mount of Olives to the east.[1] He put pressure on the food and water supplies of the inhabitants by allowing pilgrims to enter the city to celebrate Passover, and then refusing to allow them back out. After Jewish allies killed a number of Roman soldiers, Titus sent Josephus, the Jewish historian, to negotiate with the defenders; this ended with Jews wounding the negotiator with an arrow, and another sally was launched shortly after. Titus was almost captured during this sudden attack, but escaped.
In mid-May Titus set to destroying the newly built Third Wall with a ram, breaching it as well as the Second Wall, and turning his attention to the Fortress of Antonia just north of the Temple Mount. The Romans were then drawn into street fighting with the Zealots, who were then ordered to retreat to the temple to avoid heavy losses. Josephus failed in another attempt at negotiations, and Jewish attacks prevented the construction of siege towers at the Fortress of Antonia. Food, water, and other provisions were dwindling inside the city, but small foraging parties managed to sneak supplies into the city, harrying Roman forces in the process. To put an end to the foragers, orders were issued to build a new wall, and siege tower construction was restarted as well.



Catapulta, by Edward Poynter (1868). Siege engines such as this were employed by the Roman army during the siege.
After several failed attempts to breach or scale the walls of the Antonia Fortress, the Romans finally launched a secret attack, overwhelming the sleeping Zealots and taking the fortress. Overlooking the Temple compound, the fortress provided a perfect point from which to attack the Temple itself. Battering rams made little progress, but the fighting itself eventually set the walls on fire; a Roman soldier threw a burning stick onto one of the Temple's walls. Destroying the Temple was not among Titus' goals, possibly due in large part to the massive expansions done by Herod the Great mere decades earlier. Titus had wanted to seize it and transform it into a temple dedicated to the Roman Emperor and the Roman pantheon. The fire spread quickly and was soon out of control. The Temple was destroyed on Tisha B'Av, in the beginning of August, and the flames spread into the residential sections of the city.[1]
The Roman legions quickly crushed the remaining Jewish resistance. Part of the remaining Jews escaped through hidden underground tunnels, while others made a final stand in the Upper City. This defence halted the Roman advance as they had to construct siege towers to assail the remaining Jews. The city was completely under Roman control by September 7 and the Romans continued to pursue those who had fled the city.
Destruction of Jerusalem[edit]
"Destruction of Jerusalem" redirects here. For the destruction under Nebuchadnezzar, see Siege of Jerusalem (587 BC).



The Siege and Destruction of Jerusalem, by David Roberts (1850).


 Stones from the Western Wall of the Temple Mount (Jerusalem) thrown onto the street by Roman soldiers on the Ninth of Av, 70
The account of Josephus described Titus as moderate in his approach and, after conferring with others, ordering that the 500-year-old Temple be spared. (Solomon's Temple dated to the 10th century BC, though the physical structure was Herod's Temple, about 90 years old at the time.) According to Josephus, the Roman soldiers grew furious with Jewish attacks and tactics and, against Titus' orders, set fire to an apartment adjacent to the Temple, which soon spread all throughout. However, Josephus may have written this in order to appease his coreligionists.
Josephus had acted as a mediator for the Romans and, when negotiations failed, witnessed the siege and aftermath. He wrote:

Now as soon as the army had no more people to slay or to plunder, because there remained none to be the objects of their fury (for they would not have spared any, had there remained any other work to be done), [Titus] Caesar gave orders that they should now demolish the entire city and Temple, but should leave as many of the towers standing as they were of the greatest eminence; that is, Phasaelus, and Hippicus, and Mariamne; and so much of the wall enclosed the city on the west side. This wall was spared, in order to afford a camp for such as were to lie in garrison [in the Upper City], as were the towers [the three forts] also spared, in order to demonstrate to posterity what kind of city it was, and how well fortified, which the Roman valor had subdued; but for all the rest of the wall [surrounding Jerusalem], it was so thoroughly laid even with the ground by those that dug it up to the foundation, that there was left nothing to make those that came thither believe it [Jerusalem] had ever been inhabited. This was the end which Jerusalem came to by the madness of those that were for innovations; a city otherwise of great magnificence, and of mighty fame among all mankind.[2]
 And truly, the very view itself was a melancholy thing; for those places which were adorned with trees and pleasant gardens, were now become desolate country every way, and its trees were all cut down. Nor could any foreigner that had formerly seen Judaea and the most beautiful suburbs of the city, and now saw it as a desert, but lament and mourn sadly at so great a change. For the war had laid all signs of beauty quite waste. Nor had anyone who had known the place before, had come on a sudden to it now, would he have known it again. But though he [a foreigner] were at the city itself, yet would he have inquired for it.[3]
Josephus claims that 1.1 million people were killed during the siege, of which a majority were Jewish, and that 97,000 were captured and enslaved, including Simon bar Giora and John of Giscala.[4]

"The slaughter within was even more dreadful than the spectacle from without. Men and women, old and young, insurgents and priests, those who fought and those who entreated mercy, were hewn down in indiscriminate carnage. The number of the slain exceeded that of the slayers. The legionaries had to clamber over heaps of dead to carry on the work of extermination."[5]
Many fled to areas around the Mediterranean. Titus reportedly refused to accept a wreath of victory, saying that the victory did not come through his own efforts but that he had merely served as an instrument of God's wrath.[6]
Commemoration[edit]
Roman[edit]
Judaea Capta coinage: Judaea Capta coins were a series of commemorative coins originally issued by the Roman Emperor Vespasian to celebrate the capture of Judaea and the destruction of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem by his son Titus in 70 during the First Jewish Revolt.
Temple of Peace: In 75, the Temple of Peace, also known as the Forum of Vespasian, was built under Emperor Vespasian in Rome. The monument was built to celebrate the conquest of Jerusalem and it is said to have housed the Menorah from Herod's Temple.[7]
Flavian Amphitheater: Otherwise known as the Colosseum built from 70 to 80 AD. Archaeological discoveries have found a block of travertine that bears dowel holes that show the Jewish Wars financed the building of the Flavian Amphitheatre.[8]
Arch of Titus: In around c.82, Roman Emperor Domitian constructed the Arch of Titus on Via Sacra, Rome, to commemorate the capture and siege of Jerusalem in 70, which effectively ended the Great Jewish Revolt, although the Romans did not achieve complete victory until the fall of Masada in 73.
Jewish[edit]
Tisha B'Av
Perceptions[edit]
The Jewish Amoraim attributed the destruction of the Temple and Jerusalem as punishment from God for the "baseless hatred" that pervaded Jewish society at the time.[9]
In later art[edit]
The war in Judaea, particularly the siege and destruction of Jerusalem, have inspired writers and artists through the centuries. The bas-relief in the Arch of Titus has been influential in establishing the Menorah as the most dramatic symbol of the looting of the Second Temple.
Siege of Jerusalem A fourteenth century Middle English poem
The Franks Casket. The back side of the casket depicts the Siege of 70.
The Destruction of the Temple at Jerusalem by Nicolas Poussin (1637). Oil on canvas, 147 x 198,5 cm. Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna. Depicts the destruction and looting of the Second Temple by the Roman army led by Titus.
The Destruction of Jerusalem by Titus by Wilhelm von Kaulbach (1846). Oil on canvas, 585 x 705 cm. Neue Pinakothek, Munich. An allegorical depiction of the destruction of Jerusalem, dramatically centered around the figure of the High Priest, with Titus entering from the right.
The Siege and Destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans Under the Command of Titus, 70 by David Roberts (1850). Oil on canvas, 136 x 197 cm. Private collection. Depicts the burning and looting of Jerusalem by the Roman army under Titus.
The Destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem by Francesco Hayez (1867). Oil on canvas, 183 x 252 cm. Galleria d'Arte Moderna, Venice. Depicts the destruction and looting of the Second Temple by the Roman army.
See also[edit]
Council of Jamnia
Flight to Pella
Herod's Temple
Jerusalem’s Model in the Late 2nd Temple Period
Kamsa and Bar Kamsa
Preterism
Robinson's Arch
Royal Stoa (Jerusalem)
Siege of Jerusalem
Solomon's Temple
References[edit]
Cawthorne, Nigel. History's Greatest Battles: Masterstrokes of War. pp. 31–37. ISBN 1-84193-290-6.
1.^ Jump up to: a b Levick, Barbara (1999). Vespasian. London: Routledge, pp. 116–119. ISBN 0-415-16618-7
2.Jump up ^ Flavius Josephus. The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem. Containing The Interval Of About Three Years. From The Taking Of Jerusalem By Titus To The Sedition At Cyrene. Book VII. Chapter 1.1
3.Jump up ^ Flavius Josephus. The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem. BOOK VI. Containing The Interval Of About One Month. From The Great Extremity To Which The Jews Were Reduced To The Taking Of Jerusalem By Titus.. Book VI. Chapter 1.1
4.Jump up ^ Josephus, The Wars of the Jews VI.9.3
5.Jump up ^ "Milman, The History of the Jews, book 16". Crcbermuda.com. Retrieved 2013-08-31.
6.Jump up ^ Philostratus, The Life of Apollonius of Tyana 6.29
7.Jump up ^ "Cornell.edu". Cals.cornell.edu. Retrieved 2013-08-31.
8.Jump up ^ ALFÖLDY, GÉZA (1995). "Eine Bauinschrift Aus Dem Colosseum.". Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 109: 195–226.
9.Jump up ^ Yoma, 9b
External links[edit]
 Wikimedia Commons has media related to Siege of Jerusalem (70).
Second Temple and Talmudic Era.[dead link] The Jewish History Resource Center: Project of the Dinur Center for Research in Jewish History, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
The Temple Mount and Fort Antonia
Map of the siege of Jerusalem


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Categories: 70 in the Roman Empire
Ancient Jewish history during the Roman Empire
Flavian military campaigns
History of Israel
Jewish–Roman wars
Sieges involving the Roman Empire
Sieges of Jerusalem
Tabernacle and Temples in Jerusalem
Tisha B'Av
70 in military history
1st-century Judaism









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 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Jerusalem_(AD_70)










Siege of Jerusalem (AD 70)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
  (Redirected from Siege of Jerusalem (70))
Jump to: navigation, search


Siege of Jerusalem
Part of the First Jewish-Roman War
Map indicating progress of the Roman army during the siege
 Progress of the Roman army during the siege.

Date
February – August, AD 70
Location
Jerusalem, Judaea
31°46′41″N 35°14′9″ECoordinates: 31°46′41″N 35°14′9″E
Result
Roman victory
Main rebel Judean forces subdued.
Temple of Jerusalem destroyed.

Territorial
 changes
Roman rule of Jerusalem restored

Belligerents
Vexilloid of the Roman Empire Roman Empire
Judean Jews
Sadducees

Zealots
Idumeans

Commanders and leaders
Titus Simon Bar Giora
John of Gischala
Eleazar ben Simon

Strength
70,000 20,000 - 30,000 10,000
Casualties and losses
unknown 30,000 10,000
The Siege of Jerusalem in 70 AD was the decisive event of the First Jewish–Roman War. The Roman army, led by the future Emperor Titus, with Tiberius Julius Alexander as his second-in-command, besieged and conquered the city of Jerusalem, which had been occupied by its Jewish defenders in 66 AD.
The siege ended with the sacking of the city and the destruction of its famous Second Temple. The destruction of both the first and second temples is still mourned annually as the Jewish fast Tisha B'Av. The Arch of Titus, celebrating the Roman sack of Jerusalem and the Temple, still stands in Rome.


Contents  [hide]
1 Siege
2 Destruction of Jerusalem
3 Commemoration 3.1 Roman
3.2 Jewish
4 Perceptions
5 In later art
6 See also
7 References
8 External links

Siege[edit]


[show]
v ·
 t ·
 e
 
First Jewish–Roman War






































 This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (October 2010)
Despite early successes in repelling the Roman sieges, the Zealots fought amongst themselves, and they lacked proper leadership, resulting in poor discipline, training, and preparation for the battles that were to follow.
Titus surrounded the city, with three legions (V Macedonica, XII Fulminata, XV Apollinaris) on the western side and a fourth (X Fretensis) on the Mount of Olives to the east.[1] He put pressure on the food and water supplies of the inhabitants by allowing pilgrims to enter the city to celebrate Passover, and then refusing to allow them back out. After Jewish allies killed a number of Roman soldiers, Titus sent Josephus, the Jewish historian, to negotiate with the defenders; this ended with Jews wounding the negotiator with an arrow, and another sally was launched shortly after. Titus was almost captured during this sudden attack, but escaped.
In mid-May Titus set to destroying the newly built Third Wall with a ram, breaching it as well as the Second Wall, and turning his attention to the Fortress of Antonia just north of the Temple Mount. The Romans were then drawn into street fighting with the Zealots, who were then ordered to retreat to the temple to avoid heavy losses. Josephus failed in another attempt at negotiations, and Jewish attacks prevented the construction of siege towers at the Fortress of Antonia. Food, water, and other provisions were dwindling inside the city, but small foraging parties managed to sneak supplies into the city, harrying Roman forces in the process. To put an end to the foragers, orders were issued to build a new wall, and siege tower construction was restarted as well.



Catapulta, by Edward Poynter (1868). Siege engines such as this were employed by the Roman army during the siege.
After several failed attempts to breach or scale the walls of the Antonia Fortress, the Romans finally launched a secret attack, overwhelming the sleeping Zealots and taking the fortress. Overlooking the Temple compound, the fortress provided a perfect point from which to attack the Temple itself. Battering rams made little progress, but the fighting itself eventually set the walls on fire; a Roman soldier threw a burning stick onto one of the Temple's walls. Destroying the Temple was not among Titus' goals, possibly due in large part to the massive expansions done by Herod the Great mere decades earlier. Titus had wanted to seize it and transform it into a temple dedicated to the Roman Emperor and the Roman pantheon. The fire spread quickly and was soon out of control. The Temple was destroyed on Tisha B'Av, in the beginning of August, and the flames spread into the residential sections of the city.[1]
The Roman legions quickly crushed the remaining Jewish resistance. Part of the remaining Jews escaped through hidden underground tunnels, while others made a final stand in the Upper City. This defence halted the Roman advance as they had to construct siege towers to assail the remaining Jews. The city was completely under Roman control by September 7 and the Romans continued to pursue those who had fled the city.
Destruction of Jerusalem[edit]
"Destruction of Jerusalem" redirects here. For the destruction under Nebuchadnezzar, see Siege of Jerusalem (587 BC).



The Siege and Destruction of Jerusalem, by David Roberts (1850).


 Stones from the Western Wall of the Temple Mount (Jerusalem) thrown onto the street by Roman soldiers on the Ninth of Av, 70
The account of Josephus described Titus as moderate in his approach and, after conferring with others, ordering that the 500-year-old Temple be spared. (Solomon's Temple dated to the 10th century BC, though the physical structure was Herod's Temple, about 90 years old at the time.) According to Josephus, the Roman soldiers grew furious with Jewish attacks and tactics and, against Titus' orders, set fire to an apartment adjacent to the Temple, which soon spread all throughout. However, Josephus may have written this in order to appease his coreligionists.
Josephus had acted as a mediator for the Romans and, when negotiations failed, witnessed the siege and aftermath. He wrote:

Now as soon as the army had no more people to slay or to plunder, because there remained none to be the objects of their fury (for they would not have spared any, had there remained any other work to be done), [Titus] Caesar gave orders that they should now demolish the entire city and Temple, but should leave as many of the towers standing as they were of the greatest eminence; that is, Phasaelus, and Hippicus, and Mariamne; and so much of the wall enclosed the city on the west side. This wall was spared, in order to afford a camp for such as were to lie in garrison [in the Upper City], as were the towers [the three forts] also spared, in order to demonstrate to posterity what kind of city it was, and how well fortified, which the Roman valor had subdued; but for all the rest of the wall [surrounding Jerusalem], it was so thoroughly laid even with the ground by those that dug it up to the foundation, that there was left nothing to make those that came thither believe it [Jerusalem] had ever been inhabited. This was the end which Jerusalem came to by the madness of those that were for innovations; a city otherwise of great magnificence, and of mighty fame among all mankind.[2]
 And truly, the very view itself was a melancholy thing; for those places which were adorned with trees and pleasant gardens, were now become desolate country every way, and its trees were all cut down. Nor could any foreigner that had formerly seen Judaea and the most beautiful suburbs of the city, and now saw it as a desert, but lament and mourn sadly at so great a change. For the war had laid all signs of beauty quite waste. Nor had anyone who had known the place before, had come on a sudden to it now, would he have known it again. But though he [a foreigner] were at the city itself, yet would he have inquired for it.[3]
Josephus claims that 1.1 million people were killed during the siege, of which a majority were Jewish, and that 97,000 were captured and enslaved, including Simon bar Giora and John of Giscala.[4]

"The slaughter within was even more dreadful than the spectacle from without. Men and women, old and young, insurgents and priests, those who fought and those who entreated mercy, were hewn down in indiscriminate carnage. The number of the slain exceeded that of the slayers. The legionaries had to clamber over heaps of dead to carry on the work of extermination."[5]
Many fled to areas around the Mediterranean. Titus reportedly refused to accept a wreath of victory, saying that the victory did not come through his own efforts but that he had merely served as an instrument of God's wrath.[6]
Commemoration[edit]
Roman[edit]
Judaea Capta coinage: Judaea Capta coins were a series of commemorative coins originally issued by the Roman Emperor Vespasian to celebrate the capture of Judaea and the destruction of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem by his son Titus in 70 during the First Jewish Revolt.
Temple of Peace: In 75, the Temple of Peace, also known as the Forum of Vespasian, was built under Emperor Vespasian in Rome. The monument was built to celebrate the conquest of Jerusalem and it is said to have housed the Menorah from Herod's Temple.[7]
Flavian Amphitheater: Otherwise known as the Colosseum built from 70 to 80 AD. Archaeological discoveries have found a block of travertine that bears dowel holes that show the Jewish Wars financed the building of the Flavian Amphitheatre.[8]
Arch of Titus: In around c.82, Roman Emperor Domitian constructed the Arch of Titus on Via Sacra, Rome, to commemorate the capture and siege of Jerusalem in 70, which effectively ended the Great Jewish Revolt, although the Romans did not achieve complete victory until the fall of Masada in 73.
Jewish[edit]
Tisha B'Av
Perceptions[edit]
The Jewish Amoraim attributed the destruction of the Temple and Jerusalem as punishment from God for the "baseless hatred" that pervaded Jewish society at the time.[9]
In later art[edit]
The war in Judaea, particularly the siege and destruction of Jerusalem, have inspired writers and artists through the centuries. The bas-relief in the Arch of Titus has been influential in establishing the Menorah as the most dramatic symbol of the looting of the Second Temple.
Siege of Jerusalem A fourteenth century Middle English poem
The Franks Casket. The back side of the casket depicts the Siege of 70.
The Destruction of the Temple at Jerusalem by Nicolas Poussin (1637). Oil on canvas, 147 x 198,5 cm. Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna. Depicts the destruction and looting of the Second Temple by the Roman army led by Titus.
The Destruction of Jerusalem by Titus by Wilhelm von Kaulbach (1846). Oil on canvas, 585 x 705 cm. Neue Pinakothek, Munich. An allegorical depiction of the destruction of Jerusalem, dramatically centered around the figure of the High Priest, with Titus entering from the right.
The Siege and Destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans Under the Command of Titus, 70 by David Roberts (1850). Oil on canvas, 136 x 197 cm. Private collection. Depicts the burning and looting of Jerusalem by the Roman army under Titus.
The Destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem by Francesco Hayez (1867). Oil on canvas, 183 x 252 cm. Galleria d'Arte Moderna, Venice. Depicts the destruction and looting of the Second Temple by the Roman army.
See also[edit]
Council of Jamnia
Flight to Pella
Herod's Temple
Jerusalem’s Model in the Late 2nd Temple Period
Kamsa and Bar Kamsa
Preterism
Robinson's Arch
Royal Stoa (Jerusalem)
Siege of Jerusalem
Solomon's Temple
References[edit]
Cawthorne, Nigel. History's Greatest Battles: Masterstrokes of War. pp. 31–37. ISBN 1-84193-290-6.
1.^ Jump up to: a b Levick, Barbara (1999). Vespasian. London: Routledge, pp. 116–119. ISBN 0-415-16618-7
2.Jump up ^ Flavius Josephus. The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem. Containing The Interval Of About Three Years. From The Taking Of Jerusalem By Titus To The Sedition At Cyrene. Book VII. Chapter 1.1
3.Jump up ^ Flavius Josephus. The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem. BOOK VI. Containing The Interval Of About One Month. From The Great Extremity To Which The Jews Were Reduced To The Taking Of Jerusalem By Titus.. Book VI. Chapter 1.1
4.Jump up ^ Josephus, The Wars of the Jews VI.9.3
5.Jump up ^ "Milman, The History of the Jews, book 16". Crcbermuda.com. Retrieved 2013-08-31.
6.Jump up ^ Philostratus, The Life of Apollonius of Tyana 6.29
7.Jump up ^ "Cornell.edu". Cals.cornell.edu. Retrieved 2013-08-31.
8.Jump up ^ ALFÖLDY, GÉZA (1995). "Eine Bauinschrift Aus Dem Colosseum.". Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 109: 195–226.
9.Jump up ^ Yoma, 9b
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Jehovah

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This article is about the word Jehovah. For the deity, see God in Abrahamic religions. For other uses, see Jehovah (disambiguation).



 "Jehovah" at Exodus 6:3
 (1611 King James Version)
Jehovah (/dʒɨˈhoʊvə/ jə-HOH-və) is a Latinization of the Hebrew יְהֹוָה, one vocalization of the Tetragrammaton יהוה (YHWH), the proper name of the God of Israel in the Hebrew Bible. This vocalization has been transliterated as "Yehowah",[1] while YHWH itself has been transliterated as "Yahweh".[2]
יְהֹוָה appears 6,518 times in the traditional Masoretic Text, in addition to 305 instances of יֱהֹוִה (Jehovih).[3] The earliest available Latin text to use a vocalization similar to Jehovah dates from the 13th century.[4]
Most scholars believe "Jehovah" to be a late (c. 1100 CE) hybrid form derived by combining the Latin letters JHVH with the vowels of Adonai, but there is some evidence that it may already have been in use in Late Antiquity (5th century).[5][6] The consensus among scholars is that the historical vocalization of the Tetragrammaton at the time of the redaction of the Torah (6th century BCE) is most likely Yahweh, however there is disagreement. The historical vocalization was lost because in Second Temple Judaism, during the 3rd to 2nd centuries BCE, the pronunciation of the Tetragrammaton came to be avoided, being substituted with Adonai ("my Lord").
"Jehovah" was popularized in the English-speaking world by William Tyndale and other pioneer English Protestant translators,[7] but is no longer used in mainstream English translations, with Lord or LORD used instead, generally indicating that the corresponding Hebrew is Yahweh or YHWH.[8][9]:5


Contents  [hide]
1 Pronunciation 1.1 Development 1.1.1 Vowel points of יְהֹוָה and אֲדֹנָי
1.2 Introduction into English
2 Hebrew vowel points 2.1 Proponents of pre-Christian origin
2.2 Proponents of later origin
3 Early modern arguments 3.1 Discourses rejecting Jehovah
3.2 Discourses defending Jehovah
3.3 Summary of discourses
4 Usage in English Bible translations 4.1 Non-usage
5 Other usage
6 Similar Greek names 6.1 Ancient
6.2 Modern
7 Similar Latin and English transcriptions
8 See also
9 Notes
10 References
11 External links

Pronunciation


 This article may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. The specific problem is: the section is lacking in audio or textual representations of various pronunciations. Please help improve this article if you can. (December 2014)



 The name Iehova at a Norwegian church.[10]
Most scholars believe "Jehovah" to be a late (c. 1100 CE) hybrid form derived by combining the Latin letters JHVH with the vowels of Adonai, but some hold there is evidence that the Jehovah form of the Tetragrammaton may have been in use in Semitic and Greek phonetic texts and artifacts from Late Antiquity.[5][6] Others say that it is the pronunciation Yahweh that is testified in both Christian and pagan texts of the early Christian era.[5][11][12][13]
Karaite Jews,[14] as proponents of the rendering Jehovah, state that although the original pronunciation of יהוה has been obscured by disuse of the spoken name according to oral Rabbinic law, well-established English transliterations of other Hebrew personal names are accepted in normal usage, such as Joshua, Isaiah or Jesus, for which the original pronunciations may be unknown.[14] They also point out that "the English form Jehovah is quite simply an Anglicized form of Yehovah,"[14] and preserves the four Hebrew consonants "YHVH" (with the introduction of the "J" sound in English).[14][15][16] Some argue that Jehovah is preferable to Yahweh, based on their conclusion that the Tetragrammaton was likely tri-syllabic originally, and that modern forms should therefore also have three syllables.[17]
According to a Jewish tradition developed during the 3rd to 2nd centuries BCE, the Tetragrammaton is written but not pronounced. When read, substitute terms replace the divine name where יְהֹוָה appears in the text. It is widely assumed, as proposed by the 19th-century Hebrew scholar Gesenius, that the vowels of the substitutes of the name—Adonai (Lord) and Elohim (God)—were inserted by the Masoretes to indicate that these substitutes were to be used.[18] When יהוה precedes or follows Adonai, the Masoretes placed the vowel points of Elohim into the Tetragrammaton, producing a different vocalization of the Tetragrammaton יֱהֹוִה, which was read as Elohim.[19] Based on this reasoning, the form יְהֹוָה (Jehovah) has been characterized by some as a "hybrid form",[5][20] and even "a philological impossibility".[21]
Early modern translators disregarded the practice of reading Adonai (or its equivalents in Greek and Latin, Κύριος and Dominus)[22] in place of the Tetragrammaton and instead combined the four Hebrew letters of the Tetragrammaton with the vowel points that, except in synagogue scrolls, accompanied them, resulting in the form Jehovah.[23] This form, which first took effect in works dated 1278 and 1303, was adopted in Tyndale's and some other Protestant translations of the Bible.[24] In the 1611 King James Version, Jehovah occurred seven times.[25] In the 1885 English Revised Version, the form "Jehovah" occurs twelve times. In the 1901 American Standard Version the form "Je-ho’vah" became the regular English rendering of the Hebrew יהוה, all throughout, in preference to the previously dominant "the LORD", which is generally used in the King James Version.[26] It is also used in Christian hymns such as the 1771 hymn, "Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah".[27]
Development
The most widespread theory is that the Hebrew term יְהֹוָה has the vowel points of אֲדֹנָי (adonai).[28] Using the vowels of adonai, the composite hataf patah ֲ under the guttural alef א becomes a sheva ְ under the yod י, the holam ֹ is placed over the first he ה, and the qamats ָ is placed under the vav ו, giving יְהֹוָה (Jehovah). When the two names, יהוה and אדני, occur together, the former is pointed with a hataf segol ֱ under the yod י and a hiriq ִ under the second he ה, giving יֱהֹוִה, to indicate that it is to be read as (elohim) in order to avoid adonai being repeated.[29][28]
Taking the spellings at face value may have been as a result of not knowing about the Q're perpetuum, thus resulting in the term "Jehovah" and its spelling variants.[30][31] Emil G. Hirsch was among the modern scholars that recognized "Jehovah" to be "grammatically impossible"[29]



 A 1552 Latin translation of the Sefer Yetzirah, using the form Iehouah for the "magnum Nomen tetragrammatum".
The pronunciation Jehovah is believed to have arisen through the introduction of vowels of the qere—the marginal notation used by the Masoretes. In places where the consonants of the text to be read (the qere) differed from the consonants of the written text (the kethib), they wrote the qere in the margin to indicate that the kethib was read using the vowels of the qere. For a few very frequent words the marginal note was omitted, referred to as q're perpetuum.[21] One of these frequent cases was God's name, which was not to be pronounced in fear of profaning the "ineffable name". Instead, wherever יהוה (YHWH) appears in the kethib of the biblical and liturgical books, it was to be read as אֲדֹנָי (adonai, "My Lord [plural of majesty]"), or as אֱלֹהִים (elohim, "God") if adonai appears next to it.[citation needed] This combination produces יְהֹוָה (yehovah) and יֱהֹוִה (yehovih) respectively.[citation needed] יהוה is also written ’ה, or even ’ד, and read ha-Shem ("the name").[29]
Scholars are not in total agreement as to why יְהֹוָה does not have precisely the same vowel points as adonai.[citation needed] The use of the composite hataf segol ֱ in cases where the name is to be read, "elohim", has led to the opinion that the composite hataf patah ֲ ought to have been used to indicate the reading, "adonai". It has been argued conversely that the disuse of the patah is consistent with the Babylonian system, in which the composite is uncommon.[21]
Vowel points of יְהֹוָה and אֲדֹנָי



The spelling of the Tetragrammaton and connected forms in the Hebrew Masoretic text of the Bible, with vowel points shown in red.
The table below shows the vowel points of Yehovah and Adonay, indicating the simple sheva in Yehovah in contrast to the hataf patah in Adonay. As indicated to the right, the vowel points used when YHWH is intended to be pronounced as Adonai are slightly different to those used in Adonai itself.

Hebrew (Strong's #3068)
 YEHOVAH
יְהֹוָה
Hebrew (Strong's #136)
 ADONAY
אֲדֹנָי
י Yod Y א Aleph glottal stop
ְ Simple sheva E ֲ Hataf patah A
ה He H ד Dalet D
ֹ Holam O ֹ Holam O
ו Vav V נ Nun N
ָ Qamats A ָ Qamats A
ה He H י Yod Y
The difference between the vowel points of ’ǎdônây and YHWH is explained by the rules of Hebrew morphology and phonetics. Sheva and hataf-patah were allophones of the same phoneme used in different situations: hataf-patah on glottal consonants including aleph (such as the first letter in Adonai), and simple sheva on other consonants (such as the Y in YHWH).[29]
Introduction into English



 The "peculiar, special, honorable and most blessed name of God" Iehoua,
 an older English form of Jehovah
 (Roger Hutchinson, The image of God, 1550)
The Brown-Driver-Briggs Lexicon suggested that the pronunciation Jehovah was unknown until 1520 when it was introduced by Galatinus, who defended its use.
In English it appeared in William Tyndale's translation of the Pentateuch ("The Five Books of Moses") published in 1530 in Germany, where Tyndale had studied since 1524, possibly in one or more of the universities at Wittenberg, Worms and Marburg, where Hebrew was taught.[32] The spelling used by Tyndale was "Iehouah"; at that time, "I" was not distinguished from J, and U was not distinguished from V.[33] The original 1611 printing of the Authorized King James Version used "Iehovah". Tyndale wrote about the divine name: "IEHOUAH [Jehovah], is God's name; neither is any creature so called; and it is as much to say as, One that is of himself, and dependeth of nothing. Moreover, as oft as thou seest LORD in great letters (except there be any error in the printing), it is in Hebrew Iehouah, Thou that art; or, He that is."[34] The name is also found in a 1651 edition of Ramón Martí's Pugio fidei.[35]
The name Jehovah appeared in all early Protestant Bibles in English, except Coverdale's translation in 1535.[7] The Roman Catholic Douay-Rheims Bible used "the Lord", corresponding to the Latin Vulgate's use of "Dominus" (Latin for "Adonai", "Lord") to represent the Tetragrammaton. The Authorized King James Version also, which used "Jehovah" in a few places, most frequently gave "the LORD" as the equivalent of the Tetragrammaton. The name Jehovah appeared in John Rogers' Matthew Bible in 1537, the Great Bible of 1539, the Geneva Bible of 1560, Bishop's Bible of 1568 and the King James Version of 1611. More recently, it has been used in the Revised Version of 1885, the American Standard Version in 1901, and the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures of Jehovah's Witnesses in 1961.
At Exodus 6:3-6, where the King James Version has Jehovah, the Revised Standard Version (1952),[36] the New American Standard Bible (1971), the New International Version (1978), the New King James Version (1982), the New Revised Standard Version (1989), the New Century Version (1991), and the Contemporary English Version (1995) give "LORD" or "Lord" as their rendering of the Tetragrammaton, while the New Jerusalem Bible (1985), the Amplified Bible (1987), the New Living Translation (1996, revised 2007), the English Standard Version (2001), and the Holman Christian Standard Bible (2004) use the form Yahweh.
Hebrew vowel points
Modern guides to biblical Hebrew grammar, such as Duane A Garrett's A Modern Grammar for Classical Hebrew[37] state that the Hebrew vowel points now found in printed Hebrew Bibles were invented in the second half of the first millennium AD, long after the texts were written. This is indicated in the authoritative Hebrew Grammar of Gesenius,[38][39]
"Jehovist" scholars, largely earlier than the 20th century, who believe /dʒəˈhoʊvə/ to be the original pronunciation of the divine name, argue that the Hebraic vowel-points and accents were known to writers of the scriptures in antiquity and that both Scripture and history argue in favor of their ab origine status to the Hebrew language. Some members of Karaite Judaism, such as Nehemia Gordon, hold this view.[14] The antiquity of the vowel points and of the rendering Jehovah was defended by various scholars, including Michaelis,[40] Drach,[40] Stier,[40] William Fulke (1583), Johannes Buxtorf,[41] his son Johannes Buxtorf II,[42] and John Owen [43] (17th century); John Moncrieff [44] (19th century), Johann Friedrich von Meyer (1832)[45]
Jehovist writers such as Nehemia Gordon, who helped make a translation of the "Dead Sea Scrolls", have acknowledged the general agreement among scholars that the original pronunciation of the Tetragrammaton was probably Yahweh, and that the vowel points now attached to the Tetragrammaton were added to indicate that Adonai was to be read instead, as seen in the alteration of those points after prefixes. He wrote: "There is a virtual scholarly consensus concerning this name" and "this is presented as fact in every introduction to Biblical Hebrew and every scholarly discussion of the name."[46] Gordon, disputing this consensus, wrote, "However, this consensus is not based on decisive proof. We have seen that the scholarly consensus concerning Yahweh is really just a wild guess," and went on to say that the vowel points of Adonai are not correct.[47] He argued that "the name is really pronounced Ye-ho-vah with the emphasis on 'vah'. Pronouncing the name Yehovah with the emphasis on 'ho' (as in English Jehovah) would quite simply be a mistake."[48]
Proponents of pre-Christian origin
18th-century theologian John Gill puts forward the arguments of 17th-century Johannes Buxtorf II and others in his writing, A Dissertation Concerning the Antiquity of the Hebrew Language, Letters, Vowel-Points and Accents.[49] He argued for an extreme antiquity of their use,[50] rejecting the idea that the vowel points were invented by the Masoretes. Gill presented writings, including passages of scripture, that he interpreted as supportive of his "Jehovist" viewpoint that the Old Testament must have included vowel-points and accents.[51] He claimed that the use of Hebrew vowel points of יְהֹוָה, and therefore of the name Jehovah /jəˈhoʊvə/, is documented from before 200 BCE, and even back to Adam, citing Jewish tradition that Hebrew was the first language. He argued that throughout this history the Masoretes did not invent the vowel points and accents, but that they were delivered to Moses by God at Sinai, citing[52] Karaite authorities[53][54] Mordechai ben Nisan Kukizov (1699) and his associates, who stated that "all our wise men with one mouth affirm and profess that the whole law was pointed and accented, as it came out of the hands of Moses, the man of God."[40] The argument between Karaite and Rabbinic Judaism on whether it was lawful to pronounce the name represented by the Tetragrammaton[52] is claimed to show that some copies were not pointed with the vowels because of "oral law", for control of interpretation by some Judeo sects, including non-pointed copies in synagogues.[55] Gill claimed that the pronunciation /jəˈhoʊvə/ can be traced back to early historical sources which indicate that vowel points and/or accents were used in their time.[56] Sources Gill claimed supported his view include:
##The Book of Cosri and commentator Rabbi Judab Muscatus, which claim that the vowel points were taught to Adam by God.[57]
##Saadiah Gaon (927 AD)[58]
##Jerome (380 AD)[59]
##Origen (250 AD)[60]
##The Zohar (120 AD)[61]
##Jesus Christ (31 AD), based on Gill's interpretation of Matthew 5:18[62]
##Hillel the Elder and Shammai division (30 BC)[63]
##Karaites (120 BCE)[52]
##Demetrius Phalereus, librarian for Ptolemy II Philadelphus king of Egypt (277 BCE)[64]
Gill quoted Elia Levita, who said, "There is no syllable without a point, and there is no word without an accent," as showing that the vowel points and the accents found in printed Hebrew Bibles have a dependence on each other, and so Gill attributed the same antiquity to the accents as to the vowel points.[65] Gill acknowledged that Levita, "first asserted the vowel points were invented by "the men of Tiberias", but made reference to his condition that "if anyone could convince him that his opinion was contrary to the book of Zohar, he should be content to have it rejected." Gill then alludes to the book of Zohar, stating that rabbis declared it older than the Masoretes, and that it attests to the vowel-points and accents.[61]
William Fulke, John Gill, John Owen, and others held that Jesus Christ referred to a Hebrew vowel point or accent at Matthew 5:18, indicated in the King James Version by the word tittle.[66][67][68][69]
The 1602 Spanish Bible (Reina-Valera/Cipriano de Valera) used the name Iehova and gave a lengthy defense of the pronunciation Jehovah in its preface.[40]
Proponents of later origin
Despite Jehovist claims that vowel signs are necessary for reading and understanding Hebrew, modern Hebrew (apart from young children's books, some formal poetry and Hebrew primers for new immigrants), is written without vowel points.[70] The Torah scrolls do not include vowel points, and ancient Hebrew was written without vowel signs.[71][72]
The Dead Sea Scrolls, discovered in 1946 and dated from 400 BC to 70 AD,[73] include texts from the Torah or Pentateuch and from other parts of the Hebrew Bible,[74][75] and have provided documentary evidence that, in spite of claims to the contrary, the original Hebrew texts were in fact written without vowel points.[76][77] Menahem Mansoor's The Dead Sea Scrolls: A College Textbook and a Study Guide claims the vowel points found in printed Hebrew Bibles were devised in the 9th and 10th centuries.[78]
Gill's view that the Hebrew vowel points were in use at the time of Ezra or even since the origin of the Hebrew language is stated in an early 19th-century study in opposition to "the opinion of most learned men in modern times", according to whom the vowel points had been "invented since the time of Christ".[79] The study presented the following considerations:
##The argument that vowel points are necessary for learning to read Hebrew is refuted by the fact that the Samaritan text of the Bible is read without them and that several other Semitic languages, kindred to Hebrew, are written without any indications of the vowels.
##The books used in synagogue worship have always been without vowel points, which, unlike the letters, have thus never been treated as sacred.
##The Qere Kethib marginal notes give variant readings only of the letters, never of the points, an indication either that these were added later or that, if they already existed, they were seen as not so important.
##The Kabbalists drew their mysteries only from the letters and completely disregarded the points, if there were any.
##In several cases, ancient translations from the Hebrew Bible (Septuagint, Targum, Aquila of Sinope, Symmachus, Theodotion, Jerome) read the letters with vowels different from those indicated by the points, an indication that the texts from which they were translating were without points. The same holds for Origen's transliteration of the Hebrew text into Greek letters. Jerome expressly speaks of a word in Habakkuk 3:5, which in the present Masoretic Text has three consonant letters and two vowel points, as being of three letters and no vowel whatever.
##Neither the Jerusalem Talmud nor the Babylonian Talmud (in all their recounting of Rabbinical disputes about the meaning of words), nor Philo nor Josephus, nor any Christian writer for several centuries after Christ make any reference to vowel points.[80][81][82]
Early modern arguments
In the 16th and 17th centuries, various arguments were presented for and against the transcription of the form Jehovah.
Discourses rejecting Jehovah

Author
Discourse
Comments
John Drusius (Johannes Van den Driesche) (1550-1616) Tetragrammaton, sive de Nomine Die proprio, quod Tetragrammaton vocant (1604) Drusius stated "Galatinus first led us to this mistake ... I know [of] nobody who read [it] thus earlier..").[1]
 An editor of Drusius in 1698 knows of an earlier reading in Porchetus de Salvaticis however.[clarification needed][2]
 John Drusius wrote that neither יְהֹוָה nor יֱהֹוִה accurately represented God's name.[83]
Sixtinus Amama (1593–1659)[84] De nomine tetragrammato (1628) [3] Sixtinus Amama, was a Professor of Hebrew in the University of Franeker. A pupil of Drusius. [4]
Louis Cappel (1585–1658) De nomine tetragrammato (1624) Lewis Cappel reached the conclusion that Hebrew vowel points were not part of the original Hebrew language. This view was strongly contested by John Buxtorff the elder and his son.
James Altingius (1618–1679) Exercitatio grammatica de punctis ac pronunciatione tetragrammati James Altingius was a learned German divine[clarification needed]. [5]|
Discourses defending Jehovah

Author
Discourse
Comments
Nicholas Fuller (1557–1626) Dissertatio de nomine יהוה Nicholas was a Hebraist and a theologian. [6]
John Buxtorf (1564–1629) Disserto de nomine JHVH (1620); Tiberias, sive Commentarius Masoreticus (1664) John Buxtorf the elder [7] opposed the views of Elia Levita regarding the late origin (invention by the Masoretes) of the Hebrew vowel points, a subject which gave rise to the controversy between Louis Cappel and his (e.g. John Buxtorf the elder's) son, Johannes Buxtorf II the younger.
Johannes Buxtorf II (1599–1664) Tractatus de punctorum origine, antiquitate, et authoritate, oppositus Arcano puntationis revelato Ludovici Cappelli (1648) Continued his father's arguments that the pronunciation and therefore the Hebrew vowel points resulting in the name Jehovah have divine inspiration.
Thomas Gataker (1574–1654)[8] De Nomine Tetragrammato Dissertaio (1645) [9] See Memoirs of the Puritans Thomas Gataker.
John Leusden (1624–1699) Dissertationes tres, de vera lectione nominis Jehova John Leusden wrote three discourses in defense of the name Jehovah. [10]
Summary of discourses
In A Dictionary of the Bible (1863), William Robertson Smith summarized these discourses, concluding that "whatever, therefore, be the true pronunciation of the word, there can be little doubt that it is not Jehovah".[85] Despite this, he consistently uses the name Jehovah throughout his dictionary and when translating Hebrew names. Some examples include Isaiah [Jehovah's help or salvation], Jehoshua [Jehovah a helper], Jehu [Jehovah is He]. In the entry, Jehovah, Smith writes: "JEHOVAH (יְהֹוָה, usually with the vowel points of אֲדֹנָי; but when the two occur together, the former is pointed יֱהֹוִה, that is with the vowels of אֱלֹהִים, as in Obad. i. 1, Hab. iii. 19:"[86] This practice is also observed in many modern publications, such as the New Compact Bible Dictionary (Special Crusade Edition) of 1967 and Peloubet's Bible Dictionary of 1947.
Usage in English Bible translations
The following versions of the Bible render the Tetragrammaton as Jehovah either exclusively or in selected verses:
##William Tyndale, in his 1530 translation of the first five books of the English Bible, at Exodus 6:3 renders the divine name as Iehovah. In his foreword to this edition he wrote: "Iehovah is God's name... Moreover, as oft as thou seeist LORD in great letters (except there be any error in the printing) it is in Hebrew Iehovah."
##The Great Bible (1539) renders Jehovah in Psalm 33:12 and Psalm 83:18.
##The Geneva Bible (1560) translates the Tetragrammaton as Jehovah in Exodus 6:3, Psalm 83:18, Jeremiah 16:21, and Jeremiah 32:18.
##In the Bishop's Bible (1568), the word Jehovah occurs in Exodus 6:3 and Psalm 83:18.
##The Authorized King James Version (1611) renders Jehovah in Exodus 6:3, Psalm 83:18, Isaiah 12:2, Isaiah 26:4, and three times in compound place names at Genesis 22:14, Exodus 17:15 and Judges 6:24.
##Webster's Bible Translation (1833) by Noah Webster, a revision of the King James Bible, contains the form Jehovah in all cases where it appears in the original King James Version, as well as another seven times in Isaiah 51:21, Jeremiah 16:21; 23:6; 32:18; 33:16, Amos 5:8, and Micah 4:13.
##Young's Literal Translation by Robert Young (1862, 1898) renders the Tetragrammaton as Jehovah 6,831 times.
##In the Emphatic Diaglott (1864) a translation of the New Testament by Benjamin Wilson, the name Jehovah appears eighteen times.
##The English Revised Version (1885) renders the Tetragrammaton as Jehovah where it appears in the King James Version, and another eight times in Exodus 6:2,6–8, Psalm 68:20, Isaiah 49:14, Jeremiah 16:21, and Habakkuk 3:19.
##The Darby Bible (1890) by John Nelson Darby renders the Tetragrammaton as Jehovah 6,810 times.
##The Five Pauline Epistles, A New Translation (1900) by William Gunion Rutherford uses the name Jehovah six times in the Book of Romans.
##The American Standard Version (1901) renders the Tetragrammaton as Je-ho’vah in 6,823 places in the Old Testament.
##The Modern Reader's Bible (1914) by Richard Moulton uses Jehovah in Exodus 6:2–9, Exodus 22:14, Psalm 68:4, Psalm 83:18, Isaiah 12:2, Isaiah 26:4 and Jeremiah 16:20.
##The Holy Scriptures (1936, 1951), Hebrew Publishing Company, revised by Alexander Harkavy, a Hebrew Bible translation in English, contains the form Jehovah in Exodus 6:3, Psalm 83:18, and Isaiah 12:2.
##The New English Bible (1970) published by Oxford University Press uses Jehovah in Exodus 3:15 and 6:3, and in four place names at Genesis 22:14, Exodus 17:15, Judges 6:24 and Ezekiel 48:35.[87]
##The Living Bible (1971) by Kenneth N. Taylor, published by Tyndale House Publishers, Illinois, uses Jehovah extensively, as in the 1901 American Standard Version, on which it is based.
##In the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures (1961, 1984, 2013) published by the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, Jehovah appears 7,216 times, comprising 6,979 instances in the Old Testament,[88] and 237 in the New Testament—including 70 of the 78 times where the New Testament quotes an Old Testament passage containing the Tetragrammaton,[89] where the Tetragrammaton does not appear in any extant Greek manuscript.
##The Bible in Living English (1972) by Steven T. Byington, published by the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, renders the word Jehovah throughout the Old Testament over 6,800 times.
##Green's Literal Translation (1985) by Jay P. Green, Sr., renders the Tetragrammaton as "Jehovah" 6,866 times.
##The American King James Version (1999) by Michael Engelbrite renders Jehovah in all the places where it appears in the original King James Version.
##The Recovery Version (1999) renders the Tetragrammaton as Jehovah throughout the Old Testament 6,841 times.
##The Original Aramaic Bible in Plain English (2010) by David Bauscher, a self-published English translation of the New Testament, from the Aramaic of The Peshitta New Testament with a translation of the ancient Aramaic Peshitta version of Psalms & Proverbs, contains the word "JEHOVAH" over 200 times in the New Testament, where the Peshitta itself does not.
##The Divine Name King James Bible (2011), the Bible translators replaced the capitalized GOD and LORD with the English translation “Jehovah” in 6,972 places.
Non-usage
The Douay Version of 1609 renders the phrase in Exodus 6:3 as "and my name Adonai", and in its footnote says: "Adonai is not the name here vttered to Moyses but is redde in place of the vnknowen name".[90] The Challoner revision (1750) uses ADONAI with a note stating, "some moderns have framed the name Jehovah, unknown to all the ancients, whether Jews or Christians."[91]
Most modern translations exclusively use Lord or LORD, generally indicating that the corresponding Hebrew is Yahweh or YHWH (not JHVH), and in some cases saying that this name is "traditionally" transliterated as Jehovah:[8][9]:5
##The Revised Standard Version (1952), an authorized revision of the American Standard Version of 1901, replaced all 6,823 usages of Jehovah in the 1901 text with "LORD" or "GOD", depending on whether the Hebrew of the verse in question is read "Adonai" or "Elohim" in Jewish practice. A footnote on Exodus 3:15 says: "The word LORD when spelled with capital letters, stands for the divine name, YHWH." The preface states: "The word 'Jehovah' does not accurately represent any form of the name ever used in Hebrew".[92]
##The New American Bible (1970, revised 1986, 1991). Its footnote to Genesis 4:25-26 says: "... men began to call God by his personal name, Yahweh, rendered as "the LORD" in this version of the Bible."[93]
##The New American Standard Bible (1971, updated 1995), another revision of the 1901 American Standard Version, followed the example of the Revised Standard Version. Its footnotes to Exodus 3:14 and 6:3 state: "Related to the name of God, YHWH, rendered LORD, which is derived from the verb HAYAH, to be"; "Heb YHWH, usually rendered LORD". In its preface it says: "It is known that for many years YHWH has been transliterated as Yahweh, however no complete certainty attaches to this pronunciation."[94]
##The Bible in Today's English (Good News Bible), published by the American Bible Society (1976). Its preface states: "the distinctive Hebrew name for God (usually transliterated Jehovah or Yahweh) is in this translation represented by 'The Lord'." A footnote to Exodus 3:14 states: "I am sounds like the Hebrew name Yahweh traditionally transliterated as Jehovah."
##The New International Version (1978, revised 2011). Footnote to Exodus 3:15, "The Hebrew for LORD sounds like and may be related to the Hebrew for I AM in verse 14."
##The New King James Version (1982), though based on the King James Version, replaces JEHOVAH in Exodus 6:3 with "LORD", and adds a note: "Hebrew YHWH, traditionally Jehovah."
##The God's Word Translation (1985).
##The New Century Version (1987, revised 1991).
##The New International Reader's Version (1995).
##The English Standard Version (2001). Footnote to Exodus 3:15, "The word LORD, when spelled with capital letters, stands for the divine name, YHWH, which is here connected with the verb hayah, 'to be'."
Some translations use both Yahweh and LORD:
##The Amplified Bible (1965, revised 1987) generally uses Lord, but translates Exodus 6:3 as: "I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob as God Almighty [El-Shaddai], but by My name the Lord [Yahweh—the redemptive name of God] I did not make Myself known to them [in acts and great miracles]."
##The New Living Translation (1996), produced by Tyndale House Publishers as a successor to the Living Bible, generally uses LORD, but uses Yahweh in Exodus 3:15 and 6:3.
##The Holman Christian Standard Bible (2004, revised 2008) mainly uses LORD, but in its second edition increased the number of times it uses Yahweh from 78 to 495 (in 451 verses).[95]
Some translate the Tetragrammaton exclusively as Yahweh:
##The Jerusalem Bible (1966).
##The New Jerusalem Bible (1985).
##The World English Bible (1997) is based on the 1901 American Standard Version, but uses "Yahweh" instead of "Jehovah".[96]
Other usage



 The name "Jehovah" on the dome of the Old Catholic St. Martinskirche in Olten, Switzerland, 1521
Following the Middle Ages, some churches and public buildings across Europe, both before and after the Protestant Reformation were decorated with the name Jehovah. For example, the Coat of Arms of Plymouth (UK) City Council bears the Latin inscription, Turris fortissima est nomen Jehova[97] (English, "The name of Jehovah is the strongest tower"), derived from Proverbs 18:10.
Jehovah has been a popular English word for the personal name of God for several centuries. Christian hymns[98] feature the name. The form "Jehovah" also appears in reference books and novels, for example, appearing several times in the novel The Greatest Story Ever Told by Roman Catholic author Fulton Oursler.[99] Some religious groups, notably Jehovah's Witnesses[100] and proponents of the King-James-Only movement, make prominent use of the name.
In Mormonism, "Jehovah" was the name by which Jesus was known in the Old Testament, as opposed to God the Father who is referred to in the Mormon faith as "Elohim".
Similar Greek names
Ancient
##Ιουω (Iouō, [juɔ]): Pistis Sophia cited by Charles William King, which also gives Ιαω (Iaō, [jaɔ] but more frequently [101] (2nd century)
##Ιεου (Ieou, [jeu]): Pistis Sophia[101] (2nd century)
##ΙΕΗΩΟΥΑ (I-E-Ē-Ō-O-Y-A, [ieɛɔoya]), the seven vowels of the Greek alphabet arranged in this order. Charles William King attributes to a work that he calls On Interpretations[102] the statement that this was the Egyptian name of the supreme God. He comments: "This is in fact a very correct representation, if we give each vowel its true Greek sound, of the Hebrew pronunciation of the word Jehovah."[103] (2nd century)
##Ιευώ (Ievō): Eusebius, who says that Sanchuniathon received the records of the Jews from Hierombalus, priest of the god Ieuo.[104] (c. 315)
##Ιεωά (Ieōa): Hellenistic magical text[105] (2nd-3rd centuries), M. Kyriakakes[106] (2000)
Modern
##Ἰεχοβά (like Jehova[h]): Paolo Medici[107] (1755)
##Ἰεοβά (like Je[h]ova[h]): Greek Pentateuch[108] (1833), Holy Bible translated in Katharevousa Greek by Neophytus Vamvas[109] (1850)
##Ἰεχωβά (like Jehova[h]): Panagiotes Trempelas[110] (1958)
Similar Latin and English transcriptions



 Excerpts from Raymond Martin's Pugio Fidei adversus Mauros et Judaeos (1270, p. 559), containing the phrase "Jehova, sive Adonay, qvia Dominus es omnium" (Jehovah, or Adonay, for you are the Lord of all).[111]


Geneva Bible, 1560. (Psalm 83:18)


 A Latin rendering of the Tetragrammaton has been the form "Jova", sounding very similar to "Jehovah".
 (Origenis Hexaplorum, edited by Frederick Field, 1875.)
Transcriptions of יְהֹוָה similar to Jehovah occurred as early as the 12th century.
##Ieve: Petrus Alphonsi[112] (c. 1106), Alexander Geddes[113][114] (1800)
##Jehova: Raymond Martin (Raymundus Martini)[111][115] (1278), Porchetus de Salvaticis[116][117] (1303), Tremellius (1575), Marcus Marinus (1593), Charles IX of Sweden[118] (1606), Rosenmüller[119] (1820), Wilhelm Gesenius (c. 1830)[120]
##Yohoua: Raymond Martin[111] (1278)
##Yohouah: Porchetus de Salvaticis[116] (1303)
##Ieoa: Nicholas of Cusa (1428)
##Iehoua: Nicholas of Cusa (1428), Peter Galatin (Galatinus)[121] (1516)
##Iehova: Nicholas of Cusa (1428), Jacques Lefèvre d'Étaples (1514), Sebastian Münster (1526), Leo Jud (1543), Robert Estienne (1557)
##Ihehoua: Nicholas of Cusa (1428)
##Jova: 16th century,[122] Rosenmüller[119] (1820)
##Jehovah: Paul Fagius (1546), John Calvin (1557), King James Bible (1671 [OT] / 1669 [NT]), Matthew Poole[123] (1676), Benjamin Kennicott[124] (1753), Alexander Geddes[113] (1800)
##Iehouáh: Geneva Bible (1560)
##Iehovah: Authorized King James Version (1611), Henry Ainsworth (1627)
##Jovae: Rosenmüller[119] (1820)
##Yehovah: William Baillie[125] (1843)
 Wikiquote has quotations related to: Jehovah
 Wikimedia Commons has media related to Jehovah & Tetragrammaton.
See also
##Allah
##Ea
##El
##Enlil
##God in Christianity, God in Islam, God in Judaism, God in Mormonism, God in the Bahá'í Faith
##God the Father
##Gott
##I am that I am
##Jah
##Names of God
##Names of God in Judaism
##Theophoric names:
##Jehoshaphat, Jehonadab, Tobijah
##Yam (Ya'a, Yaw)

Notes
1.Jump up ^ GOD, NAMES OF - 5. Yahweh (Yahweh) - Bible Study Tools. Retrieved 19 November 2014.
2.Jump up ^ Preface to the New American Standard Bible
3.Jump up ^ Brown-Driver-Briggs Lexicon
4.Jump up ^ Pugio fidei by Raymund Martin, written in about 1270
5.^ Jump up to: a b c d Roy Kotansky, Jeffrey Spier, "The 'Horned Hunter' on a Lost Gnostic Gem", The Harvard Theological Review, Vol. 88, No. 3 (Jul., 1995), p. 318. Quote: "Although most scholars believe "Jehovah" to be a late (c. 1100 CE) hybrid form derived by combining the Latin letters JHVH with the vowels of Adonai (the traditionally pronounced version of יהוה), many magical texts in Semitic and Greek establish an early pronunciation of the divine name as both Yehovah and Yahweh"
6.^ Jump up to: a b George Wesley Buchanan, "The Tower of Siloam", The Expository Times 2003; 115: 37; pp. 40, 41. Quote from Note 19: "This [Yehowah] is the correct pronunciation of the tetragramaton, as is clear from the pronunciation of proper names in the First Testament (FT), poetry, fifth-century Aramaic documents, Greek translations of the name in the Dead Sea Scrolls and church fathers."
7.^ Jump up to: a b In the 7th paragraph of Introduction to the Old Testament of the New English Bible, Sir Godfry Driver wrote, "The early translators generally substituted 'Lord' for [YHWH]. [...] The Reformers preferred Jehovah, which first appeared as Iehouah in 1530 A.D., in Tyndale's translation of the Pentateuch (Exodus 6.3), from which it passed into other Protestant Bibles."
8.^ Jump up to: a b English Standard Version Translation Oversight Committee Preface to the English Standard Version Quote: "When the vowels of the word adonai are placed with the consonants of YHWH, this results in the familiar word Jehovah that was used in some earlier English Bible translations. As is common among English translations today, the ESV usually renders the personal name of God (YHWH) with the word Lord (printed in small capitals)."
9.^ Jump up to: a b Bruce M. Metzger for the New Revised Standard Version Committee. To the Reader
10.Jump up ^ Source: The Divine Name in Norway,
11.Jump up ^ Jarl Fossum and Brian Glazer in their article Seth in the Magical Texts (Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphie 100 (1994), p. 86-92, reproduced here [11], give the name "Yahweh" as the source of a number of names found in pagan magical texts: Ἰάβας (p. 88), Iaō (described as "a Greek form of the name of the Biblical God, Yahweh", on p. 89), Iaba, Iaē, Iaēo, Iaō, Iaēō (p. 89). On page 92, they call "Iaō" "the divine name".
12.Jump up ^ Eerdman's Dictionary of the Bible (2000), p. 1402
13.Jump up ^ Kristin De Troyer The Names of God, Their Pronunciation and Their Translation, – lectio difficilior 2/2005. Quote: "IAO can be seen as a transliteration of YAHU, the three-letter form of the Name of God" (p. 6).
14.^ Jump up to: a b c d e The Pronunciation of the Name
15.Jump up ^ Scott Jones - יהוה Jehovah יהוה
16.Jump up ^ Carl D. Franklin - Debunking the Myths of Sacred Namers יהוה - Christian Biblical Church of God - December 9, 1997 - Retrieved 25 August 2011.
17.Jump up ^ George Wesley Buchanan, "How God's Name Was Pronounced," Biblical Archaeology Review 21.2 (March -April 1995), 31-32
18.Jump up ^ "יְהֹוָה Jehovah, pr[oper] name of the supreme God amongst the Hebrews. The later Hebrews, for some centuries before the time of Christ, either misled by a false interpretation of certain laws (Ex. 20:7; Lev. 24:11), or else following some old superstition, regarded this name as so very holy, that it might not even be pronounced (see Philo, Vit. Mosis t.iii. p.519, 529). Whenever, therefore, this nomen tetragrammaton occurred in the sacred text, they were accustomed to substitute for it אֲדֹנָי, and thus the vowels of the noun אֲדֹנָי are in the Masoretic text placed under the four letters יהוה, but with this difference, that the initial Yod receives a simple and not a compound Sh’va (יְהֹוָה [Yehovah], not (יֲהֹוָה [Yahovah]); prefixes, however, receive the same points as if they were followed by אֲדֹנָי [...] This custom was already in vogue in the days of the LXX. translators; and thus it is that they every where translated יְהֹוָה by ὁ Κύριος (אֲדֹנָי)." (H. W. F. Gesenius, Gesenius's Hebrew-Chaldee Lexicon to the Old Testament, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1979[1847]), p. 337)
19.Jump up ^ For example, Deuteronomy 3:24, Deuteronomy 9:26 (second instance), Judges 16:28 (second instance), Genesis 15:2
20.Jump up ^ R. Laird Harris, "The Pronunciation of the Tetragram," in John H. Skilton (ed.), The Law and the Prophets: Old Testament Studies Prepared in Honor of Oswald Thompson Allis (Presbyterian and Reformed, 1974), 224.
21.^ Jump up to: a b c Jewish Encyclopedia: article: Name of God
22.Jump up ^ The Latin Vulgate of St. Jerome renders the name as Adonai at Exodus 6:3 rather than as Dominus.
23.Jump up ^ 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica: article Jehovah (Yahweh)
24.Jump up ^ In the 7th paragraph of Introduction to the Old Testament of the New English Bible, Sir Godfrey Driver wrote of the combination of the vowels of Adonai and Elohim with the consonants of the divine name, that it "did not become effective until Yehova or Jehova or Johova appeared in two Latin works dated in A.D. 1278 and A.D. 1303; the shortened Jova (declined like a Latin noun) came into use in the sixteenth century. The Reformers preferred Jehovah, which first appeared as Iehouah in 1530 A.D., in Tyndale's translation of the Pentateuch (Exodus 6.3), from which it passed into other Protestant Bibles."
25.Jump up ^ At Gen.22:14; Ex.6:3; 17:15; Jg.6:24; Ps.83:18, Is.12:2; 26:4. Strong's Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible (Iowa Falls: Word, 1994), 722.
26.Jump up ^ According to the preface, this was because the translators felt that the "Jewish superstition, which regarded the Divine Name as too sacred to be uttered, ought no longer to dominate in the English or any other version of the Old Testament".
27.Jump up ^ The original hymn, without "Jehovah", was composed in Welsh in 1745; the English translation, with "Jehovah", was composed in 1771 (Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah).
28.^ Jump up to: a b Paul Joüon and T. Muraoka. A Grammar of Biblical Hebrew (Subsidia Biblica). Part One: Orthography and Phonetics. Rome : Editrice Pontificio Istituto Biblio, 1996. ISBN 978-8876535956. Quote from Section 16(f)(1)" "The Qre is יְהֹוָה the Lord, whilst the Ktiv is probably(1) יַהְוֶה (according to ancient witnesses)." "Note 1: In our translations, we have used Yahweh, a form widely accepted by scholars, instead of the traditional Jehovah"
29.^ Jump up to: a b c d Jewish Encyclopedia of 1901-1906
30.Jump up ^ Marvin H. Pope "Job – Introduction, in Job (The Anchor Bible, Vol. 15). February 19, 1965 page XIV ISBN 9780385008945
31.Jump up ^ Moore, George Foot (1911). 311 "Jehovah" in Encyclopædia Britannica, Volume 15. Edited by Hugh Chisholm (11th ed.)
32.Jump up ^ Dahlia M. Karpman "Tyndale's Response to the Hebraic Tradition" in Studies in the Renaissance, Vol. 14 (1967)), pp. 113, 118, 119. Note: Westcott, in his survey of the English Bible, wrote that Tyndale "felt by a happy instinct the potential affinity between Hebrew and English idioms, and enriched our language and thought for ever with the characteristics of the Semitic mind."
33.Jump up ^ The first English-language book to make a clear distinction between I and J was published in 1634. (The Cambridge History of the English Language, Richard M. Hogg, (Cambridge University Press 1992 ISBN=0-521-26476-6, p. 39). It was also only by the mid-1500s that V was used to represent the consonant and U the vowel sound, while capital U was not accepted as a distinct letter until many years later (Letter by Letter: An Alphabetical Miscellany, Laurent Pflughaupt, (Princeton Architectural Press ISBN 978-1-56898-737-8) pp. 123–124).
34.Jump up ^ William Tyndale, Doctrinal Treatises, ed. Henry Walter (Cambridge, 1848), p. 408.
35.Jump up ^ Wikisource-logo.svg "Jehovah (Yahweh)". Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company. 1913.
36.Jump up ^ Exodus 6:3-5 RSV
37.Jump up ^ Duane A. Garrett, A Modern Grammar for Classical Hebrew (Broadman & Holman 2002 ISBN 0-8054-2159-9), p. 13
38.Jump up ^ Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar (1910 Kautzsch-Cowley edition), p. 38
39.Jump up ^ Christo H. J. Van der Merwe, Jackie A. Naude and Jan H. Kroeze, A Biblical Reference Grammar (Sheffield, England:Sheffield Academic Press, 2002), and Gary D. Pratico and Miles V. Van Pelt, Basics of Biblical Hebrew Grammar (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publ. House, 2001)
40.^ Jump up to: a b c d e (In Awe of Thy Word, G.A. Riplinger-Chapter 11, page 416)Online
41.Jump up ^ Tiberias, sive Commentarius Masoreticus (1620; quarto edition, improved and enlarged by J. Buxtorf the younger, 1665)
42.Jump up ^ Tractatus de punctorum origine, antiquitate, et authoritate, oppositus Arcano puntationis revelato Ludovici Cappelli (1648)
43.Jump up ^ Biblical Theology (Morgan, PA: Soli Deo Gloria Publications, 1996 reprint of the 1661 edition), pp. 495-533
44.Jump up ^ An Essay on the Antiquity and Utility of the Hebrew Vowel-Points (Glasgow: John Reid & Co., 1833).
45.Jump up ^ Blätter für höhere Wahrheit vol. 11, 1832, pp. 305, 306.
46.Jump up ^ Nehemia Gordon, The Pronunciation of the Name,pp. 1-2
47.Jump up ^ Nehemia Gordon, The Pronunciation of the Name,p. 8
48.Jump up ^ Nehemia Gordon, The Pronunciation of the Name,p. 11
49.Jump up ^ Gill 1778
50.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, pp. 499–560
51.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, pp. 549–560
52.^ Jump up to: a b c Gill 1778, pp. 538–542
53.Jump up ^ In Awe of Thy Word, G.A. Riplinger-Chapter 11, pp. 422–435
54.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, p. 540
55.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, pp. 548–560
56.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, p. 462
57.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, pp. 461–462
58.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, p. 501
59.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, pp. 512–516
60.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, p. 522
61.^ Jump up to: a b Gill 1778, p. 531
62.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, pp. 535–536
63.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, pp. 536–537
64.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, p. 544
65.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, p. 499
66.Jump up ^ One of the definitions of "tittle" in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary is "a point or small sign used as a diacritical mark in writing or printing".
67.Jump up ^ pg. 110, Of the Integrity and Purity of the Hebrew and Greek Text of the Scripture; with Considerations on the Prolegomena and Appendix to the Late “Biblia Polyglotta,” in vol. IX, The Works of John Owen, ed. Gould, William H, & Quick, Charles W., Philadelphia, PA: Leighton Publications, 1865)
68.Jump up ^ For the meanings of the word κεραία in the original texts of Matthew 5:18 and Luke 16:17 see Liddell and Scott and for a more modern scholarly view of its meaning in that context see Strong's Greek Dictionary.
69.Jump up ^ "Search => [word] => tittle :: 1828 Dictionary :: Search the 1828 Noah Webster's Dictionary of the English Language (FREE)". 1828.mshaffer.com. 2009-10-16. Retrieved 2013-03-26.
70.Jump up ^ Jewish Virtual Library: Vowels and Points
71.Jump up ^ At Home with Hebrew
72.Jump up ^ Page H. Kenney, Biblical Hebrew: an introductory grammar 1992
73.Jump up ^ Old Testament Manuscripts
74.Jump up ^ James C. VanderKam, The Dead Sea Scrolls Today, p. 30
75.Jump up ^ The Dead Sea Scrolls Biblical Manuscripts
76.Jump up ^ The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Graphological Investigation
77.Jump up ^ William P. Griffin, Killing a Dead Language: A Case against Emphasizing Vowel Pointing when Teaching Biblical Hebrew
78.Jump up ^ The Dead Sea Scrolls: A College Textbook and a Study Guide, pp. 75-76
79.Jump up ^ Godfrey Higgins, On the Vowel Points of the Hebrew Language, in The Classical Journal for March and June 1826, p. 145
80.Jump up ^ Higgins, pp. 146-149
81.Jump up ^ Augustin Calmet, Dictionary of the Bible, pp. 618-619
82.Jump up ^ B. Pick, The Vowel-Points Controversy in the XVI. and XVII. Centuries
83.Jump up ^ See Gérard Gertoux, The name of God Y.EH.OW.AH which is pronounced as it is written I_EH_OU_AH, pp. 209, 210.
84.Jump up ^ See page 8
85.Jump up ^ Smith commented, "In the decade of dissertations collected by Reland, Fuller, Gataker, and Leusden do battle for the pronunciation Jehovah, against such formidable antagonists as Drusius, Amama, Cappellus, Buxtorf, and Altingius, who, it is scarcely necessary to say, fairly beat their opponents out of the field; "the only argument of any weight, which is employed by the advocates of the pronunciation of the word as it is written being that derived from the form in which it appears in proper names, such as Jehoshaphat, Jehoram, &c. [...] Their antagonists make a strong point of the fact that, as has been noticed above, two different sets of vowel points are applied to the same consonants under certain circumstances. To this Leusden, of all the champions on his side, but feebly replies. [...] The same may be said of the argument derived from the fact that the letters מוכלב, when prefixed to יהוה, take, not the vowels which they would regularly receive were the present pronunciation true, but those with which they would be written if אֲדֹנָי, adonai, were the reading; and that the letters ordinarily taking dagesh lene when following יהוה would, according to the rules of the Hebrew points, be written without dagesh, whereas it is uniformly inserted."
86.Jump up ^ Image of it.
87.Jump up ^ Introduction to the Old Testament of the New English Bible
88.Jump up ^ Revised New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures. Accessed 14 October 2013.
89.Jump up ^ Of the 78 passages where the New Testament, using Κύριος (Lord) for the Tetragrammaton of the Hebrew text, quotes an Old Testament passage, the New World Translation puts "Jehovah" for Κύριος in 70 instances, "God" for Κύριος in 5 (Rom 11:2, 8; Gal 1:15; Heb 9:20; 1 Pet 4:14), and "Lord" for Κύριος in 3 (2 Thes 1:9; 1 Pet 2:3, 3:15) – Jason BeDuhn, Truth in Translation (University Press of America 2003 ISBN 0-7618-2556-8), pp. 174-175
90.Jump up ^ Rheims Douai, 1582-1610: a machine-readable transcript
91.Jump up ^ Douay-Rheims Bible
92.Jump up ^ Preface to the Revised Standard Version
93.Jump up ^ New American Bible, Genesis, Chapter 4
94.Jump up ^ Foreword and Preface to the New American Standard Bible
95.Jump up ^ John W. Gillis, The HCSB 2nd Edition and the Tetragrammaton
96.Jump up ^ How does the WEB compare to other translations?
97.Jump up ^ See CivicHeraldry.co.uk -Plymouth and here [12]. Also, Civic Heraldry of the United Kingdom)
98.Jump up ^ e.g. "Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah" (1771)
99.Jump up ^ Full text of "The Greatest Story Ever Told A Tale Of The Greatest Life Ever Lived" - Internet Archive - Retrieved 2 September 2011.
100.Jump up ^ "How God's Name Has Been Made Known". Awake!: 20. December 2007. "The commonly used form of God’s name in English is Jehovah, translated from the Hebrew [Tetragrammaton], which appears some 7,000 times in the Bible."
101.^ Jump up to: a b Charles William King, The Gnostics and their remains: Ancient and Mediaeval (1887), p. 285
102.Jump up ^ He speaks of it as anonymous: "the writer 'On Interpretations'". Aristotle's De Interpretatione does not speak of Egyptians.
103.Jump up ^ Charles William King, The Gnostics and their remains: Ancient and Mediaeval (1887), pp. 199-200.
104.Jump up ^ Praeparatio evangelica 10.9.
105.Jump up ^ The Grecised Hebrew text "εληιε Ιεωα ρουβα" is interpreted as meaning "my God Ieoa is mightier". ("La prononciation 'Jehova' du tétragramme", O.T.S. vol. 5, 1948, pp. 57, 58. [Greek papyrus CXXI 1.528-540 (3rd century), Library of the British Museum]
106.Jump up ^ Article in the Aster magazine (January 2000), the official periodical of the Greek Evangelical Church.
107.Jump up ^ Greek translation by Ioannes Stanos.
108.Jump up ^ Published by the British and Foreign Bible Society.
109.Jump up ^ Exodus 6:3, etc.
110.Jump up ^ Dogmatike tes Orthodoxou Katholikes Ekklesias (Dogmatics of the Orthodox Catholic Church), 3rd ed., 1997 (c. 1958), Vol. 1, p. 229.
111.^ Jump up to: a b c Pugio Fidei, in which Martin argued that the vowel points were added to the Hebrew text only in the 10th century (Thomas D. Ross, The Battle over the Hebrew Vowel Points Examined Particularly as Waged in England, p. 5).
112.Jump up ^ Dahlia M. Karpman, "Tyndale's Response to the Hebraic Tradition" (Studies in the Renaissance, Vol. 14 (1967)), p. 121.
113.^ Jump up to: a b See comments at Exodus 6:2, 3 in his Critical Remarks on the Hebrew Scriptures (1800).
114.Jump up ^ Rev. Richard Barrett's A Synopsis of Criticisms upon Passages of the Old Testament (1847) p. 219.
115.Jump up ^ Gérard Gertoux, The name of God Y.eH.oW.aH which is pronounced as it is written I_EH_OU_AH, page 152; a photo of a bilingual Latin (or Spanish) text and Hebrew text [side by side] written by Raymond Martin in 1278, with in its last sentence "יְהוָֹה" opposite "Yohoua".
116.^ Jump up to: a b Victory Against the Ungodly Hebrews. Gérard Gertoux, The name of God Y.eH.oW.aH, p. 153.
117.Jump up ^ [13]; George Moore, Notes on the Name YHWH (The American Journal of Theology, Vol. 12, No. 1. (Jan., 1908), pp. 34-52.
118.Jump up ^ Charles IX of Sweden instituted the Royal Order of Jehova in 1606.
119.^ Jump up to: a b c Scholia in Vetus Testamentum, vol. 3, part 3, pp. 8, 9, etc.
120.Jump up ^ For example, Gesenius rendered Proverbs 8:22 in Latin as: "Jehova creavit me ab initio creationis". (Samuel Lee, A lexicon, Hebrew, Chaldee, and English (1840) p. 143)
121.Jump up ^ "Non enim h quatuor liter [yhwh] si, ut punctat sunt, legantur, Ioua reddunt: sed (ut ipse optime nosti) Iehoua efficiunt." (De Arcanis Catholicæ Veritatis (1518), folio xliii. See Oxford English Dictionary Online, 1989/2008, Oxford University Press, "Jehovah"). Peter Galatin was Pope Leo X's confessor.
122.Jump up ^ Sir Godfrey Driver, Introduction to the Old Testament of the New English Bible.
123.Jump up ^ See Poole's comments at Exodus 6:2, 3 in his Synopsis criticorum biblicorum.
124.Jump up ^ The State of the printed Hebrew Text of the Old Testament considered: A Dissertation in two parts (1753), pp. 158, 159)
125.Jump up ^ The First Twelve Psalms in Hebrew, p. 22.
References
##Gill, John (1778). "A Dissertation Concerning the Antiquity of the Hebrew Language, Letters, Vowel-Points, and Accents". A collection of sermons and tracts ...: To which are prefixed, memoirs of the life, writing, and character of the author 3. G. Keith.
External links
 Wikiquote has quotations related to: Jehovah
## "Tetragrammaton". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). 1911.
## "Jehovah". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). 1911.
##Wikisource-logo.svg "Jehovah". New International Encyclopedia. 1905.
##"Jehovah (Yahweh)", Catholic Encyclopedia 1910
##"Tetragrammaton", Jewish Encyclopedia 1906


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Jehovah

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This article is about the word Jehovah. For the deity, see God in Abrahamic religions. For other uses, see Jehovah (disambiguation).



 "Jehovah" at Exodus 6:3
 (1611 King James Version)
Jehovah (/dʒɨˈhoʊvə/ jə-HOH-və) is a Latinization of the Hebrew יְהֹוָה, one vocalization of the Tetragrammaton יהוה (YHWH), the proper name of the God of Israel in the Hebrew Bible. This vocalization has been transliterated as "Yehowah",[1] while YHWH itself has been transliterated as "Yahweh".[2]
יְהֹוָה appears 6,518 times in the traditional Masoretic Text, in addition to 305 instances of יֱהֹוִה (Jehovih).[3] The earliest available Latin text to use a vocalization similar to Jehovah dates from the 13th century.[4]
Most scholars believe "Jehovah" to be a late (c. 1100 CE) hybrid form derived by combining the Latin letters JHVH with the vowels of Adonai, but there is some evidence that it may already have been in use in Late Antiquity (5th century).[5][6] The consensus among scholars is that the historical vocalization of the Tetragrammaton at the time of the redaction of the Torah (6th century BCE) is most likely Yahweh, however there is disagreement. The historical vocalization was lost because in Second Temple Judaism, during the 3rd to 2nd centuries BCE, the pronunciation of the Tetragrammaton came to be avoided, being substituted with Adonai ("my Lord").
"Jehovah" was popularized in the English-speaking world by William Tyndale and other pioneer English Protestant translators,[7] but is no longer used in mainstream English translations, with Lord or LORD used instead, generally indicating that the corresponding Hebrew is Yahweh or YHWH.[8][9]:5


Contents  [hide]
1 Pronunciation 1.1 Development 1.1.1 Vowel points of יְהֹוָה and אֲדֹנָי
1.2 Introduction into English
2 Hebrew vowel points 2.1 Proponents of pre-Christian origin
2.2 Proponents of later origin
3 Early modern arguments 3.1 Discourses rejecting Jehovah
3.2 Discourses defending Jehovah
3.3 Summary of discourses
4 Usage in English Bible translations 4.1 Non-usage
5 Other usage
6 Similar Greek names 6.1 Ancient
6.2 Modern
7 Similar Latin and English transcriptions
8 See also
9 Notes
10 References
11 External links

Pronunciation


 This article may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. The specific problem is: the section is lacking in audio or textual representations of various pronunciations. Please help improve this article if you can. (December 2014)



 The name Iehova at a Norwegian church.[10]
Most scholars believe "Jehovah" to be a late (c. 1100 CE) hybrid form derived by combining the Latin letters JHVH with the vowels of Adonai, but some hold there is evidence that the Jehovah form of the Tetragrammaton may have been in use in Semitic and Greek phonetic texts and artifacts from Late Antiquity.[5][6] Others say that it is the pronunciation Yahweh that is testified in both Christian and pagan texts of the early Christian era.[5][11][12][13]
Karaite Jews,[14] as proponents of the rendering Jehovah, state that although the original pronunciation of יהוה has been obscured by disuse of the spoken name according to oral Rabbinic law, well-established English transliterations of other Hebrew personal names are accepted in normal usage, such as Joshua, Isaiah or Jesus, for which the original pronunciations may be unknown.[14] They also point out that "the English form Jehovah is quite simply an Anglicized form of Yehovah,"[14] and preserves the four Hebrew consonants "YHVH" (with the introduction of the "J" sound in English).[14][15][16] Some argue that Jehovah is preferable to Yahweh, based on their conclusion that the Tetragrammaton was likely tri-syllabic originally, and that modern forms should therefore also have three syllables.[17]
According to a Jewish tradition developed during the 3rd to 2nd centuries BCE, the Tetragrammaton is written but not pronounced. When read, substitute terms replace the divine name where יְהֹוָה appears in the text. It is widely assumed, as proposed by the 19th-century Hebrew scholar Gesenius, that the vowels of the substitutes of the name—Adonai (Lord) and Elohim (God)—were inserted by the Masoretes to indicate that these substitutes were to be used.[18] When יהוה precedes or follows Adonai, the Masoretes placed the vowel points of Elohim into the Tetragrammaton, producing a different vocalization of the Tetragrammaton יֱהֹוִה, which was read as Elohim.[19] Based on this reasoning, the form יְהֹוָה (Jehovah) has been characterized by some as a "hybrid form",[5][20] and even "a philological impossibility".[21]
Early modern translators disregarded the practice of reading Adonai (or its equivalents in Greek and Latin, Κύριος and Dominus)[22] in place of the Tetragrammaton and instead combined the four Hebrew letters of the Tetragrammaton with the vowel points that, except in synagogue scrolls, accompanied them, resulting in the form Jehovah.[23] This form, which first took effect in works dated 1278 and 1303, was adopted in Tyndale's and some other Protestant translations of the Bible.[24] In the 1611 King James Version, Jehovah occurred seven times.[25] In the 1885 English Revised Version, the form "Jehovah" occurs twelve times. In the 1901 American Standard Version the form "Je-ho’vah" became the regular English rendering of the Hebrew יהוה, all throughout, in preference to the previously dominant "the LORD", which is generally used in the King James Version.[26] It is also used in Christian hymns such as the 1771 hymn, "Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah".[27]
Development
The most widespread theory is that the Hebrew term יְהֹוָה has the vowel points of אֲדֹנָי (adonai).[28] Using the vowels of adonai, the composite hataf patah ֲ under the guttural alef א becomes a sheva ְ under the yod י, the holam ֹ is placed over the first he ה, and the qamats ָ is placed under the vav ו, giving יְהֹוָה (Jehovah). When the two names, יהוה and אדני, occur together, the former is pointed with a hataf segol ֱ under the yod י and a hiriq ִ under the second he ה, giving יֱהֹוִה, to indicate that it is to be read as (elohim) in order to avoid adonai being repeated.[29][28]
Taking the spellings at face value may have been as a result of not knowing about the Q're perpetuum, thus resulting in the term "Jehovah" and its spelling variants.[30][31] Emil G. Hirsch was among the modern scholars that recognized "Jehovah" to be "grammatically impossible"[29]



 A 1552 Latin translation of the Sefer Yetzirah, using the form Iehouah for the "magnum Nomen tetragrammatum".
The pronunciation Jehovah is believed to have arisen through the introduction of vowels of the qere—the marginal notation used by the Masoretes. In places where the consonants of the text to be read (the qere) differed from the consonants of the written text (the kethib), they wrote the qere in the margin to indicate that the kethib was read using the vowels of the qere. For a few very frequent words the marginal note was omitted, referred to as q're perpetuum.[21] One of these frequent cases was God's name, which was not to be pronounced in fear of profaning the "ineffable name". Instead, wherever יהוה (YHWH) appears in the kethib of the biblical and liturgical books, it was to be read as אֲדֹנָי (adonai, "My Lord [plural of majesty]"), or as אֱלֹהִים (elohim, "God") if adonai appears next to it.[citation needed] This combination produces יְהֹוָה (yehovah) and יֱהֹוִה (yehovih) respectively.[citation needed] יהוה is also written ’ה, or even ’ד, and read ha-Shem ("the name").[29]
Scholars are not in total agreement as to why יְהֹוָה does not have precisely the same vowel points as adonai.[citation needed] The use of the composite hataf segol ֱ in cases where the name is to be read, "elohim", has led to the opinion that the composite hataf patah ֲ ought to have been used to indicate the reading, "adonai". It has been argued conversely that the disuse of the patah is consistent with the Babylonian system, in which the composite is uncommon.[21]
Vowel points of יְהֹוָה and אֲדֹנָי



The spelling of the Tetragrammaton and connected forms in the Hebrew Masoretic text of the Bible, with vowel points shown in red.
The table below shows the vowel points of Yehovah and Adonay, indicating the simple sheva in Yehovah in contrast to the hataf patah in Adonay. As indicated to the right, the vowel points used when YHWH is intended to be pronounced as Adonai are slightly different to those used in Adonai itself.

Hebrew (Strong's #3068)
 YEHOVAH
יְהֹוָה
Hebrew (Strong's #136)
 ADONAY
אֲדֹנָי
י Yod Y א Aleph glottal stop
ְ Simple sheva E ֲ Hataf patah A
ה He H ד Dalet D
ֹ Holam O ֹ Holam O
ו Vav V נ Nun N
ָ Qamats A ָ Qamats A
ה He H י Yod Y
The difference between the vowel points of ’ǎdônây and YHWH is explained by the rules of Hebrew morphology and phonetics. Sheva and hataf-patah were allophones of the same phoneme used in different situations: hataf-patah on glottal consonants including aleph (such as the first letter in Adonai), and simple sheva on other consonants (such as the Y in YHWH).[29]
Introduction into English



 The "peculiar, special, honorable and most blessed name of God" Iehoua,
 an older English form of Jehovah
 (Roger Hutchinson, The image of God, 1550)
The Brown-Driver-Briggs Lexicon suggested that the pronunciation Jehovah was unknown until 1520 when it was introduced by Galatinus, who defended its use.
In English it appeared in William Tyndale's translation of the Pentateuch ("The Five Books of Moses") published in 1530 in Germany, where Tyndale had studied since 1524, possibly in one or more of the universities at Wittenberg, Worms and Marburg, where Hebrew was taught.[32] The spelling used by Tyndale was "Iehouah"; at that time, "I" was not distinguished from J, and U was not distinguished from V.[33] The original 1611 printing of the Authorized King James Version used "Iehovah". Tyndale wrote about the divine name: "IEHOUAH [Jehovah], is God's name; neither is any creature so called; and it is as much to say as, One that is of himself, and dependeth of nothing. Moreover, as oft as thou seest LORD in great letters (except there be any error in the printing), it is in Hebrew Iehouah, Thou that art; or, He that is."[34] The name is also found in a 1651 edition of Ramón Martí's Pugio fidei.[35]
The name Jehovah appeared in all early Protestant Bibles in English, except Coverdale's translation in 1535.[7] The Roman Catholic Douay-Rheims Bible used "the Lord", corresponding to the Latin Vulgate's use of "Dominus" (Latin for "Adonai", "Lord") to represent the Tetragrammaton. The Authorized King James Version also, which used "Jehovah" in a few places, most frequently gave "the LORD" as the equivalent of the Tetragrammaton. The name Jehovah appeared in John Rogers' Matthew Bible in 1537, the Great Bible of 1539, the Geneva Bible of 1560, Bishop's Bible of 1568 and the King James Version of 1611. More recently, it has been used in the Revised Version of 1885, the American Standard Version in 1901, and the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures of Jehovah's Witnesses in 1961.
At Exodus 6:3-6, where the King James Version has Jehovah, the Revised Standard Version (1952),[36] the New American Standard Bible (1971), the New International Version (1978), the New King James Version (1982), the New Revised Standard Version (1989), the New Century Version (1991), and the Contemporary English Version (1995) give "LORD" or "Lord" as their rendering of the Tetragrammaton, while the New Jerusalem Bible (1985), the Amplified Bible (1987), the New Living Translation (1996, revised 2007), the English Standard Version (2001), and the Holman Christian Standard Bible (2004) use the form Yahweh.
Hebrew vowel points
Modern guides to biblical Hebrew grammar, such as Duane A Garrett's A Modern Grammar for Classical Hebrew[37] state that the Hebrew vowel points now found in printed Hebrew Bibles were invented in the second half of the first millennium AD, long after the texts were written. This is indicated in the authoritative Hebrew Grammar of Gesenius,[38][39]
"Jehovist" scholars, largely earlier than the 20th century, who believe /dʒəˈhoʊvə/ to be the original pronunciation of the divine name, argue that the Hebraic vowel-points and accents were known to writers of the scriptures in antiquity and that both Scripture and history argue in favor of their ab origine status to the Hebrew language. Some members of Karaite Judaism, such as Nehemia Gordon, hold this view.[14] The antiquity of the vowel points and of the rendering Jehovah was defended by various scholars, including Michaelis,[40] Drach,[40] Stier,[40] William Fulke (1583), Johannes Buxtorf,[41] his son Johannes Buxtorf II,[42] and John Owen [43] (17th century); John Moncrieff [44] (19th century), Johann Friedrich von Meyer (1832)[45]
Jehovist writers such as Nehemia Gordon, who helped make a translation of the "Dead Sea Scrolls", have acknowledged the general agreement among scholars that the original pronunciation of the Tetragrammaton was probably Yahweh, and that the vowel points now attached to the Tetragrammaton were added to indicate that Adonai was to be read instead, as seen in the alteration of those points after prefixes. He wrote: "There is a virtual scholarly consensus concerning this name" and "this is presented as fact in every introduction to Biblical Hebrew and every scholarly discussion of the name."[46] Gordon, disputing this consensus, wrote, "However, this consensus is not based on decisive proof. We have seen that the scholarly consensus concerning Yahweh is really just a wild guess," and went on to say that the vowel points of Adonai are not correct.[47] He argued that "the name is really pronounced Ye-ho-vah with the emphasis on 'vah'. Pronouncing the name Yehovah with the emphasis on 'ho' (as in English Jehovah) would quite simply be a mistake."[48]
Proponents of pre-Christian origin
18th-century theologian John Gill puts forward the arguments of 17th-century Johannes Buxtorf II and others in his writing, A Dissertation Concerning the Antiquity of the Hebrew Language, Letters, Vowel-Points and Accents.[49] He argued for an extreme antiquity of their use,[50] rejecting the idea that the vowel points were invented by the Masoretes. Gill presented writings, including passages of scripture, that he interpreted as supportive of his "Jehovist" viewpoint that the Old Testament must have included vowel-points and accents.[51] He claimed that the use of Hebrew vowel points of יְהֹוָה, and therefore of the name Jehovah /jəˈhoʊvə/, is documented from before 200 BCE, and even back to Adam, citing Jewish tradition that Hebrew was the first language. He argued that throughout this history the Masoretes did not invent the vowel points and accents, but that they were delivered to Moses by God at Sinai, citing[52] Karaite authorities[53][54] Mordechai ben Nisan Kukizov (1699) and his associates, who stated that "all our wise men with one mouth affirm and profess that the whole law was pointed and accented, as it came out of the hands of Moses, the man of God."[40] The argument between Karaite and Rabbinic Judaism on whether it was lawful to pronounce the name represented by the Tetragrammaton[52] is claimed to show that some copies were not pointed with the vowels because of "oral law", for control of interpretation by some Judeo sects, including non-pointed copies in synagogues.[55] Gill claimed that the pronunciation /jəˈhoʊvə/ can be traced back to early historical sources which indicate that vowel points and/or accents were used in their time.[56] Sources Gill claimed supported his view include:
##The Book of Cosri and commentator Rabbi Judab Muscatus, which claim that the vowel points were taught to Adam by God.[57]
##Saadiah Gaon (927 AD)[58]
##Jerome (380 AD)[59]
##Origen (250 AD)[60]
##The Zohar (120 AD)[61]
##Jesus Christ (31 AD), based on Gill's interpretation of Matthew 5:18[62]
##Hillel the Elder and Shammai division (30 BC)[63]
##Karaites (120 BCE)[52]
##Demetrius Phalereus, librarian for Ptolemy II Philadelphus king of Egypt (277 BCE)[64]
Gill quoted Elia Levita, who said, "There is no syllable without a point, and there is no word without an accent," as showing that the vowel points and the accents found in printed Hebrew Bibles have a dependence on each other, and so Gill attributed the same antiquity to the accents as to the vowel points.[65] Gill acknowledged that Levita, "first asserted the vowel points were invented by "the men of Tiberias", but made reference to his condition that "if anyone could convince him that his opinion was contrary to the book of Zohar, he should be content to have it rejected." Gill then alludes to the book of Zohar, stating that rabbis declared it older than the Masoretes, and that it attests to the vowel-points and accents.[61]
William Fulke, John Gill, John Owen, and others held that Jesus Christ referred to a Hebrew vowel point or accent at Matthew 5:18, indicated in the King James Version by the word tittle.[66][67][68][69]
The 1602 Spanish Bible (Reina-Valera/Cipriano de Valera) used the name Iehova and gave a lengthy defense of the pronunciation Jehovah in its preface.[40]
Proponents of later origin
Despite Jehovist claims that vowel signs are necessary for reading and understanding Hebrew, modern Hebrew (apart from young children's books, some formal poetry and Hebrew primers for new immigrants), is written without vowel points.[70] The Torah scrolls do not include vowel points, and ancient Hebrew was written without vowel signs.[71][72]
The Dead Sea Scrolls, discovered in 1946 and dated from 400 BC to 70 AD,[73] include texts from the Torah or Pentateuch and from other parts of the Hebrew Bible,[74][75] and have provided documentary evidence that, in spite of claims to the contrary, the original Hebrew texts were in fact written without vowel points.[76][77] Menahem Mansoor's The Dead Sea Scrolls: A College Textbook and a Study Guide claims the vowel points found in printed Hebrew Bibles were devised in the 9th and 10th centuries.[78]
Gill's view that the Hebrew vowel points were in use at the time of Ezra or even since the origin of the Hebrew language is stated in an early 19th-century study in opposition to "the opinion of most learned men in modern times", according to whom the vowel points had been "invented since the time of Christ".[79] The study presented the following considerations:
##The argument that vowel points are necessary for learning to read Hebrew is refuted by the fact that the Samaritan text of the Bible is read without them and that several other Semitic languages, kindred to Hebrew, are written without any indications of the vowels.
##The books used in synagogue worship have always been without vowel points, which, unlike the letters, have thus never been treated as sacred.
##The Qere Kethib marginal notes give variant readings only of the letters, never of the points, an indication either that these were added later or that, if they already existed, they were seen as not so important.
##The Kabbalists drew their mysteries only from the letters and completely disregarded the points, if there were any.
##In several cases, ancient translations from the Hebrew Bible (Septuagint, Targum, Aquila of Sinope, Symmachus, Theodotion, Jerome) read the letters with vowels different from those indicated by the points, an indication that the texts from which they were translating were without points. The same holds for Origen's transliteration of the Hebrew text into Greek letters. Jerome expressly speaks of a word in Habakkuk 3:5, which in the present Masoretic Text has three consonant letters and two vowel points, as being of three letters and no vowel whatever.
##Neither the Jerusalem Talmud nor the Babylonian Talmud (in all their recounting of Rabbinical disputes about the meaning of words), nor Philo nor Josephus, nor any Christian writer for several centuries after Christ make any reference to vowel points.[80][81][82]
Early modern arguments
In the 16th and 17th centuries, various arguments were presented for and against the transcription of the form Jehovah.
Discourses rejecting Jehovah

Author
Discourse
Comments
John Drusius (Johannes Van den Driesche) (1550-1616) Tetragrammaton, sive de Nomine Die proprio, quod Tetragrammaton vocant (1604) Drusius stated "Galatinus first led us to this mistake ... I know [of] nobody who read [it] thus earlier..").[1]
 An editor of Drusius in 1698 knows of an earlier reading in Porchetus de Salvaticis however.[clarification needed][2]
 John Drusius wrote that neither יְהֹוָה nor יֱהֹוִה accurately represented God's name.[83]
Sixtinus Amama (1593–1659)[84] De nomine tetragrammato (1628) [3] Sixtinus Amama, was a Professor of Hebrew in the University of Franeker. A pupil of Drusius. [4]
Louis Cappel (1585–1658) De nomine tetragrammato (1624) Lewis Cappel reached the conclusion that Hebrew vowel points were not part of the original Hebrew language. This view was strongly contested by John Buxtorff the elder and his son.
James Altingius (1618–1679) Exercitatio grammatica de punctis ac pronunciatione tetragrammati James Altingius was a learned German divine[clarification needed]. [5]|
Discourses defending Jehovah

Author
Discourse
Comments
Nicholas Fuller (1557–1626) Dissertatio de nomine יהוה Nicholas was a Hebraist and a theologian. [6]
John Buxtorf (1564–1629) Disserto de nomine JHVH (1620); Tiberias, sive Commentarius Masoreticus (1664) John Buxtorf the elder [7] opposed the views of Elia Levita regarding the late origin (invention by the Masoretes) of the Hebrew vowel points, a subject which gave rise to the controversy between Louis Cappel and his (e.g. John Buxtorf the elder's) son, Johannes Buxtorf II the younger.
Johannes Buxtorf II (1599–1664) Tractatus de punctorum origine, antiquitate, et authoritate, oppositus Arcano puntationis revelato Ludovici Cappelli (1648) Continued his father's arguments that the pronunciation and therefore the Hebrew vowel points resulting in the name Jehovah have divine inspiration.
Thomas Gataker (1574–1654)[8] De Nomine Tetragrammato Dissertaio (1645) [9] See Memoirs of the Puritans Thomas Gataker.
John Leusden (1624–1699) Dissertationes tres, de vera lectione nominis Jehova John Leusden wrote three discourses in defense of the name Jehovah. [10]
Summary of discourses
In A Dictionary of the Bible (1863), William Robertson Smith summarized these discourses, concluding that "whatever, therefore, be the true pronunciation of the word, there can be little doubt that it is not Jehovah".[85] Despite this, he consistently uses the name Jehovah throughout his dictionary and when translating Hebrew names. Some examples include Isaiah [Jehovah's help or salvation], Jehoshua [Jehovah a helper], Jehu [Jehovah is He]. In the entry, Jehovah, Smith writes: "JEHOVAH (יְהֹוָה, usually with the vowel points of אֲדֹנָי; but when the two occur together, the former is pointed יֱהֹוִה, that is with the vowels of אֱלֹהִים, as in Obad. i. 1, Hab. iii. 19:"[86] This practice is also observed in many modern publications, such as the New Compact Bible Dictionary (Special Crusade Edition) of 1967 and Peloubet's Bible Dictionary of 1947.
Usage in English Bible translations
The following versions of the Bible render the Tetragrammaton as Jehovah either exclusively or in selected verses:
##William Tyndale, in his 1530 translation of the first five books of the English Bible, at Exodus 6:3 renders the divine name as Iehovah. In his foreword to this edition he wrote: "Iehovah is God's name... Moreover, as oft as thou seeist LORD in great letters (except there be any error in the printing) it is in Hebrew Iehovah."
##The Great Bible (1539) renders Jehovah in Psalm 33:12 and Psalm 83:18.
##The Geneva Bible (1560) translates the Tetragrammaton as Jehovah in Exodus 6:3, Psalm 83:18, Jeremiah 16:21, and Jeremiah 32:18.
##In the Bishop's Bible (1568), the word Jehovah occurs in Exodus 6:3 and Psalm 83:18.
##The Authorized King James Version (1611) renders Jehovah in Exodus 6:3, Psalm 83:18, Isaiah 12:2, Isaiah 26:4, and three times in compound place names at Genesis 22:14, Exodus 17:15 and Judges 6:24.
##Webster's Bible Translation (1833) by Noah Webster, a revision of the King James Bible, contains the form Jehovah in all cases where it appears in the original King James Version, as well as another seven times in Isaiah 51:21, Jeremiah 16:21; 23:6; 32:18; 33:16, Amos 5:8, and Micah 4:13.
##Young's Literal Translation by Robert Young (1862, 1898) renders the Tetragrammaton as Jehovah 6,831 times.
##In the Emphatic Diaglott (1864) a translation of the New Testament by Benjamin Wilson, the name Jehovah appears eighteen times.
##The English Revised Version (1885) renders the Tetragrammaton as Jehovah where it appears in the King James Version, and another eight times in Exodus 6:2,6–8, Psalm 68:20, Isaiah 49:14, Jeremiah 16:21, and Habakkuk 3:19.
##The Darby Bible (1890) by John Nelson Darby renders the Tetragrammaton as Jehovah 6,810 times.
##The Five Pauline Epistles, A New Translation (1900) by William Gunion Rutherford uses the name Jehovah six times in the Book of Romans.
##The American Standard Version (1901) renders the Tetragrammaton as Je-ho’vah in 6,823 places in the Old Testament.
##The Modern Reader's Bible (1914) by Richard Moulton uses Jehovah in Exodus 6:2–9, Exodus 22:14, Psalm 68:4, Psalm 83:18, Isaiah 12:2, Isaiah 26:4 and Jeremiah 16:20.
##The Holy Scriptures (1936, 1951), Hebrew Publishing Company, revised by Alexander Harkavy, a Hebrew Bible translation in English, contains the form Jehovah in Exodus 6:3, Psalm 83:18, and Isaiah 12:2.
##The New English Bible (1970) published by Oxford University Press uses Jehovah in Exodus 3:15 and 6:3, and in four place names at Genesis 22:14, Exodus 17:15, Judges 6:24 and Ezekiel 48:35.[87]
##The Living Bible (1971) by Kenneth N. Taylor, published by Tyndale House Publishers, Illinois, uses Jehovah extensively, as in the 1901 American Standard Version, on which it is based.
##In the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures (1961, 1984, 2013) published by the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, Jehovah appears 7,216 times, comprising 6,979 instances in the Old Testament,[88] and 237 in the New Testament—including 70 of the 78 times where the New Testament quotes an Old Testament passage containing the Tetragrammaton,[89] where the Tetragrammaton does not appear in any extant Greek manuscript.
##The Bible in Living English (1972) by Steven T. Byington, published by the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, renders the word Jehovah throughout the Old Testament over 6,800 times.
##Green's Literal Translation (1985) by Jay P. Green, Sr., renders the Tetragrammaton as "Jehovah" 6,866 times.
##The American King James Version (1999) by Michael Engelbrite renders Jehovah in all the places where it appears in the original King James Version.
##The Recovery Version (1999) renders the Tetragrammaton as Jehovah throughout the Old Testament 6,841 times.
##The Original Aramaic Bible in Plain English (2010) by David Bauscher, a self-published English translation of the New Testament, from the Aramaic of The Peshitta New Testament with a translation of the ancient Aramaic Peshitta version of Psalms & Proverbs, contains the word "JEHOVAH" over 200 times in the New Testament, where the Peshitta itself does not.
##The Divine Name King James Bible (2011), the Bible translators replaced the capitalized GOD and LORD with the English translation “Jehovah” in 6,972 places.
Non-usage
The Douay Version of 1609 renders the phrase in Exodus 6:3 as "and my name Adonai", and in its footnote says: "Adonai is not the name here vttered to Moyses but is redde in place of the vnknowen name".[90] The Challoner revision (1750) uses ADONAI with a note stating, "some moderns have framed the name Jehovah, unknown to all the ancients, whether Jews or Christians."[91]
Most modern translations exclusively use Lord or LORD, generally indicating that the corresponding Hebrew is Yahweh or YHWH (not JHVH), and in some cases saying that this name is "traditionally" transliterated as Jehovah:[8][9]:5
##The Revised Standard Version (1952), an authorized revision of the American Standard Version of 1901, replaced all 6,823 usages of Jehovah in the 1901 text with "LORD" or "GOD", depending on whether the Hebrew of the verse in question is read "Adonai" or "Elohim" in Jewish practice. A footnote on Exodus 3:15 says: "The word LORD when spelled with capital letters, stands for the divine name, YHWH." The preface states: "The word 'Jehovah' does not accurately represent any form of the name ever used in Hebrew".[92]
##The New American Bible (1970, revised 1986, 1991). Its footnote to Genesis 4:25-26 says: "... men began to call God by his personal name, Yahweh, rendered as "the LORD" in this version of the Bible."[93]
##The New American Standard Bible (1971, updated 1995), another revision of the 1901 American Standard Version, followed the example of the Revised Standard Version. Its footnotes to Exodus 3:14 and 6:3 state: "Related to the name of God, YHWH, rendered LORD, which is derived from the verb HAYAH, to be"; "Heb YHWH, usually rendered LORD". In its preface it says: "It is known that for many years YHWH has been transliterated as Yahweh, however no complete certainty attaches to this pronunciation."[94]
##The Bible in Today's English (Good News Bible), published by the American Bible Society (1976). Its preface states: "the distinctive Hebrew name for God (usually transliterated Jehovah or Yahweh) is in this translation represented by 'The Lord'." A footnote to Exodus 3:14 states: "I am sounds like the Hebrew name Yahweh traditionally transliterated as Jehovah."
##The New International Version (1978, revised 2011). Footnote to Exodus 3:15, "The Hebrew for LORD sounds like and may be related to the Hebrew for I AM in verse 14."
##The New King James Version (1982), though based on the King James Version, replaces JEHOVAH in Exodus 6:3 with "LORD", and adds a note: "Hebrew YHWH, traditionally Jehovah."
##The God's Word Translation (1985).
##The New Century Version (1987, revised 1991).
##The New International Reader's Version (1995).
##The English Standard Version (2001). Footnote to Exodus 3:15, "The word LORD, when spelled with capital letters, stands for the divine name, YHWH, which is here connected with the verb hayah, 'to be'."
Some translations use both Yahweh and LORD:
##The Amplified Bible (1965, revised 1987) generally uses Lord, but translates Exodus 6:3 as: "I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob as God Almighty [El-Shaddai], but by My name the Lord [Yahweh—the redemptive name of God] I did not make Myself known to them [in acts and great miracles]."
##The New Living Translation (1996), produced by Tyndale House Publishers as a successor to the Living Bible, generally uses LORD, but uses Yahweh in Exodus 3:15 and 6:3.
##The Holman Christian Standard Bible (2004, revised 2008) mainly uses LORD, but in its second edition increased the number of times it uses Yahweh from 78 to 495 (in 451 verses).[95]
Some translate the Tetragrammaton exclusively as Yahweh:
##The Jerusalem Bible (1966).
##The New Jerusalem Bible (1985).
##The World English Bible (1997) is based on the 1901 American Standard Version, but uses "Yahweh" instead of "Jehovah".[96]
Other usage



 The name "Jehovah" on the dome of the Old Catholic St. Martinskirche in Olten, Switzerland, 1521
Following the Middle Ages, some churches and public buildings across Europe, both before and after the Protestant Reformation were decorated with the name Jehovah. For example, the Coat of Arms of Plymouth (UK) City Council bears the Latin inscription, Turris fortissima est nomen Jehova[97] (English, "The name of Jehovah is the strongest tower"), derived from Proverbs 18:10.
Jehovah has been a popular English word for the personal name of God for several centuries. Christian hymns[98] feature the name. The form "Jehovah" also appears in reference books and novels, for example, appearing several times in the novel The Greatest Story Ever Told by Roman Catholic author Fulton Oursler.[99] Some religious groups, notably Jehovah's Witnesses[100] and proponents of the King-James-Only movement, make prominent use of the name.
In Mormonism, "Jehovah" was the name by which Jesus was known in the Old Testament, as opposed to God the Father who is referred to in the Mormon faith as "Elohim".
Similar Greek names
Ancient
##Ιουω (Iouō, [juɔ]): Pistis Sophia cited by Charles William King, which also gives Ιαω (Iaō, [jaɔ] but more frequently [101] (2nd century)
##Ιεου (Ieou, [jeu]): Pistis Sophia[101] (2nd century)
##ΙΕΗΩΟΥΑ (I-E-Ē-Ō-O-Y-A, [ieɛɔoya]), the seven vowels of the Greek alphabet arranged in this order. Charles William King attributes to a work that he calls On Interpretations[102] the statement that this was the Egyptian name of the supreme God. He comments: "This is in fact a very correct representation, if we give each vowel its true Greek sound, of the Hebrew pronunciation of the word Jehovah."[103] (2nd century)
##Ιευώ (Ievō): Eusebius, who says that Sanchuniathon received the records of the Jews from Hierombalus, priest of the god Ieuo.[104] (c. 315)
##Ιεωά (Ieōa): Hellenistic magical text[105] (2nd-3rd centuries), M. Kyriakakes[106] (2000)
Modern
##Ἰεχοβά (like Jehova[h]): Paolo Medici[107] (1755)
##Ἰεοβά (like Je[h]ova[h]): Greek Pentateuch[108] (1833), Holy Bible translated in Katharevousa Greek by Neophytus Vamvas[109] (1850)
##Ἰεχωβά (like Jehova[h]): Panagiotes Trempelas[110] (1958)
Similar Latin and English transcriptions



 Excerpts from Raymond Martin's Pugio Fidei adversus Mauros et Judaeos (1270, p. 559), containing the phrase "Jehova, sive Adonay, qvia Dominus es omnium" (Jehovah, or Adonay, for you are the Lord of all).[111]


Geneva Bible, 1560. (Psalm 83:18)


 A Latin rendering of the Tetragrammaton has been the form "Jova", sounding very similar to "Jehovah".
 (Origenis Hexaplorum, edited by Frederick Field, 1875.)
Transcriptions of יְהֹוָה similar to Jehovah occurred as early as the 12th century.
##Ieve: Petrus Alphonsi[112] (c. 1106), Alexander Geddes[113][114] (1800)
##Jehova: Raymond Martin (Raymundus Martini)[111][115] (1278), Porchetus de Salvaticis[116][117] (1303), Tremellius (1575), Marcus Marinus (1593), Charles IX of Sweden[118] (1606), Rosenmüller[119] (1820), Wilhelm Gesenius (c. 1830)[120]
##Yohoua: Raymond Martin[111] (1278)
##Yohouah: Porchetus de Salvaticis[116] (1303)
##Ieoa: Nicholas of Cusa (1428)
##Iehoua: Nicholas of Cusa (1428), Peter Galatin (Galatinus)[121] (1516)
##Iehova: Nicholas of Cusa (1428), Jacques Lefèvre d'Étaples (1514), Sebastian Münster (1526), Leo Jud (1543), Robert Estienne (1557)
##Ihehoua: Nicholas of Cusa (1428)
##Jova: 16th century,[122] Rosenmüller[119] (1820)
##Jehovah: Paul Fagius (1546), John Calvin (1557), King James Bible (1671 [OT] / 1669 [NT]), Matthew Poole[123] (1676), Benjamin Kennicott[124] (1753), Alexander Geddes[113] (1800)
##Iehouáh: Geneva Bible (1560)
##Iehovah: Authorized King James Version (1611), Henry Ainsworth (1627)
##Jovae: Rosenmüller[119] (1820)
##Yehovah: William Baillie[125] (1843)
 Wikiquote has quotations related to: Jehovah
 Wikimedia Commons has media related to Jehovah & Tetragrammaton.
See also
##Allah
##Ea
##El
##Enlil
##God in Christianity, God in Islam, God in Judaism, God in Mormonism, God in the Bahá'í Faith
##God the Father
##Gott
##I am that I am
##Jah
##Names of God
##Names of God in Judaism
##Theophoric names:
##Jehoshaphat, Jehonadab, Tobijah
##Yam (Ya'a, Yaw)

Notes
1.Jump up ^ GOD, NAMES OF - 5. Yahweh (Yahweh) - Bible Study Tools. Retrieved 19 November 2014.
2.Jump up ^ Preface to the New American Standard Bible
3.Jump up ^ Brown-Driver-Briggs Lexicon
4.Jump up ^ Pugio fidei by Raymund Martin, written in about 1270
5.^ Jump up to: a b c d Roy Kotansky, Jeffrey Spier, "The 'Horned Hunter' on a Lost Gnostic Gem", The Harvard Theological Review, Vol. 88, No. 3 (Jul., 1995), p. 318. Quote: "Although most scholars believe "Jehovah" to be a late (c. 1100 CE) hybrid form derived by combining the Latin letters JHVH with the vowels of Adonai (the traditionally pronounced version of יהוה), many magical texts in Semitic and Greek establish an early pronunciation of the divine name as both Yehovah and Yahweh"
6.^ Jump up to: a b George Wesley Buchanan, "The Tower of Siloam", The Expository Times 2003; 115: 37; pp. 40, 41. Quote from Note 19: "This [Yehowah] is the correct pronunciation of the tetragramaton, as is clear from the pronunciation of proper names in the First Testament (FT), poetry, fifth-century Aramaic documents, Greek translations of the name in the Dead Sea Scrolls and church fathers."
7.^ Jump up to: a b In the 7th paragraph of Introduction to the Old Testament of the New English Bible, Sir Godfry Driver wrote, "The early translators generally substituted 'Lord' for [YHWH]. [...] The Reformers preferred Jehovah, which first appeared as Iehouah in 1530 A.D., in Tyndale's translation of the Pentateuch (Exodus 6.3), from which it passed into other Protestant Bibles."
8.^ Jump up to: a b English Standard Version Translation Oversight Committee Preface to the English Standard Version Quote: "When the vowels of the word adonai are placed with the consonants of YHWH, this results in the familiar word Jehovah that was used in some earlier English Bible translations. As is common among English translations today, the ESV usually renders the personal name of God (YHWH) with the word Lord (printed in small capitals)."
9.^ Jump up to: a b Bruce M. Metzger for the New Revised Standard Version Committee. To the Reader
10.Jump up ^ Source: The Divine Name in Norway,
11.Jump up ^ Jarl Fossum and Brian Glazer in their article Seth in the Magical Texts (Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphie 100 (1994), p. 86-92, reproduced here [11], give the name "Yahweh" as the source of a number of names found in pagan magical texts: Ἰάβας (p. 88), Iaō (described as "a Greek form of the name of the Biblical God, Yahweh", on p. 89), Iaba, Iaē, Iaēo, Iaō, Iaēō (p. 89). On page 92, they call "Iaō" "the divine name".
12.Jump up ^ Eerdman's Dictionary of the Bible (2000), p. 1402
13.Jump up ^ Kristin De Troyer The Names of God, Their Pronunciation and Their Translation, – lectio difficilior 2/2005. Quote: "IAO can be seen as a transliteration of YAHU, the three-letter form of the Name of God" (p. 6).
14.^ Jump up to: a b c d e The Pronunciation of the Name
15.Jump up ^ Scott Jones - יהוה Jehovah יהוה
16.Jump up ^ Carl D. Franklin - Debunking the Myths of Sacred Namers יהוה - Christian Biblical Church of God - December 9, 1997 - Retrieved 25 August 2011.
17.Jump up ^ George Wesley Buchanan, "How God's Name Was Pronounced," Biblical Archaeology Review 21.2 (March -April 1995), 31-32
18.Jump up ^ "יְהֹוָה Jehovah, pr[oper] name of the supreme God amongst the Hebrews. The later Hebrews, for some centuries before the time of Christ, either misled by a false interpretation of certain laws (Ex. 20:7; Lev. 24:11), or else following some old superstition, regarded this name as so very holy, that it might not even be pronounced (see Philo, Vit. Mosis t.iii. p.519, 529). Whenever, therefore, this nomen tetragrammaton occurred in the sacred text, they were accustomed to substitute for it אֲדֹנָי, and thus the vowels of the noun אֲדֹנָי are in the Masoretic text placed under the four letters יהוה, but with this difference, that the initial Yod receives a simple and not a compound Sh’va (יְהֹוָה [Yehovah], not (יֲהֹוָה [Yahovah]); prefixes, however, receive the same points as if they were followed by אֲדֹנָי [...] This custom was already in vogue in the days of the LXX. translators; and thus it is that they every where translated יְהֹוָה by ὁ Κύριος (אֲדֹנָי)." (H. W. F. Gesenius, Gesenius's Hebrew-Chaldee Lexicon to the Old Testament, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1979[1847]), p. 337)
19.Jump up ^ For example, Deuteronomy 3:24, Deuteronomy 9:26 (second instance), Judges 16:28 (second instance), Genesis 15:2
20.Jump up ^ R. Laird Harris, "The Pronunciation of the Tetragram," in John H. Skilton (ed.), The Law and the Prophets: Old Testament Studies Prepared in Honor of Oswald Thompson Allis (Presbyterian and Reformed, 1974), 224.
21.^ Jump up to: a b c Jewish Encyclopedia: article: Name of God
22.Jump up ^ The Latin Vulgate of St. Jerome renders the name as Adonai at Exodus 6:3 rather than as Dominus.
23.Jump up ^ 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica: article Jehovah (Yahweh)
24.Jump up ^ In the 7th paragraph of Introduction to the Old Testament of the New English Bible, Sir Godfrey Driver wrote of the combination of the vowels of Adonai and Elohim with the consonants of the divine name, that it "did not become effective until Yehova or Jehova or Johova appeared in two Latin works dated in A.D. 1278 and A.D. 1303; the shortened Jova (declined like a Latin noun) came into use in the sixteenth century. The Reformers preferred Jehovah, which first appeared as Iehouah in 1530 A.D., in Tyndale's translation of the Pentateuch (Exodus 6.3), from which it passed into other Protestant Bibles."
25.Jump up ^ At Gen.22:14; Ex.6:3; 17:15; Jg.6:24; Ps.83:18, Is.12:2; 26:4. Strong's Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible (Iowa Falls: Word, 1994), 722.
26.Jump up ^ According to the preface, this was because the translators felt that the "Jewish superstition, which regarded the Divine Name as too sacred to be uttered, ought no longer to dominate in the English or any other version of the Old Testament".
27.Jump up ^ The original hymn, without "Jehovah", was composed in Welsh in 1745; the English translation, with "Jehovah", was composed in 1771 (Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah).
28.^ Jump up to: a b Paul Joüon and T. Muraoka. A Grammar of Biblical Hebrew (Subsidia Biblica). Part One: Orthography and Phonetics. Rome : Editrice Pontificio Istituto Biblio, 1996. ISBN 978-8876535956. Quote from Section 16(f)(1)" "The Qre is יְהֹוָה the Lord, whilst the Ktiv is probably(1) יַהְוֶה (according to ancient witnesses)." "Note 1: In our translations, we have used Yahweh, a form widely accepted by scholars, instead of the traditional Jehovah"
29.^ Jump up to: a b c d Jewish Encyclopedia of 1901-1906
30.Jump up ^ Marvin H. Pope "Job – Introduction, in Job (The Anchor Bible, Vol. 15). February 19, 1965 page XIV ISBN 9780385008945
31.Jump up ^ Moore, George Foot (1911). 311 "Jehovah" in Encyclopædia Britannica, Volume 15. Edited by Hugh Chisholm (11th ed.)
32.Jump up ^ Dahlia M. Karpman "Tyndale's Response to the Hebraic Tradition" in Studies in the Renaissance, Vol. 14 (1967)), pp. 113, 118, 119. Note: Westcott, in his survey of the English Bible, wrote that Tyndale "felt by a happy instinct the potential affinity between Hebrew and English idioms, and enriched our language and thought for ever with the characteristics of the Semitic mind."
33.Jump up ^ The first English-language book to make a clear distinction between I and J was published in 1634. (The Cambridge History of the English Language, Richard M. Hogg, (Cambridge University Press 1992 ISBN=0-521-26476-6, p. 39). It was also only by the mid-1500s that V was used to represent the consonant and U the vowel sound, while capital U was not accepted as a distinct letter until many years later (Letter by Letter: An Alphabetical Miscellany, Laurent Pflughaupt, (Princeton Architectural Press ISBN 978-1-56898-737-8) pp. 123–124).
34.Jump up ^ William Tyndale, Doctrinal Treatises, ed. Henry Walter (Cambridge, 1848), p. 408.
35.Jump up ^ Wikisource-logo.svg "Jehovah (Yahweh)". Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company. 1913.
36.Jump up ^ Exodus 6:3-5 RSV
37.Jump up ^ Duane A. Garrett, A Modern Grammar for Classical Hebrew (Broadman & Holman 2002 ISBN 0-8054-2159-9), p. 13
38.Jump up ^ Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar (1910 Kautzsch-Cowley edition), p. 38
39.Jump up ^ Christo H. J. Van der Merwe, Jackie A. Naude and Jan H. Kroeze, A Biblical Reference Grammar (Sheffield, England:Sheffield Academic Press, 2002), and Gary D. Pratico and Miles V. Van Pelt, Basics of Biblical Hebrew Grammar (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publ. House, 2001)
40.^ Jump up to: a b c d e (In Awe of Thy Word, G.A. Riplinger-Chapter 11, page 416)Online
41.Jump up ^ Tiberias, sive Commentarius Masoreticus (1620; quarto edition, improved and enlarged by J. Buxtorf the younger, 1665)
42.Jump up ^ Tractatus de punctorum origine, antiquitate, et authoritate, oppositus Arcano puntationis revelato Ludovici Cappelli (1648)
43.Jump up ^ Biblical Theology (Morgan, PA: Soli Deo Gloria Publications, 1996 reprint of the 1661 edition), pp. 495-533
44.Jump up ^ An Essay on the Antiquity and Utility of the Hebrew Vowel-Points (Glasgow: John Reid & Co., 1833).
45.Jump up ^ Blätter für höhere Wahrheit vol. 11, 1832, pp. 305, 306.
46.Jump up ^ Nehemia Gordon, The Pronunciation of the Name,pp. 1-2
47.Jump up ^ Nehemia Gordon, The Pronunciation of the Name,p. 8
48.Jump up ^ Nehemia Gordon, The Pronunciation of the Name,p. 11
49.Jump up ^ Gill 1778
50.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, pp. 499–560
51.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, pp. 549–560
52.^ Jump up to: a b c Gill 1778, pp. 538–542
53.Jump up ^ In Awe of Thy Word, G.A. Riplinger-Chapter 11, pp. 422–435
54.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, p. 540
55.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, pp. 548–560
56.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, p. 462
57.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, pp. 461–462
58.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, p. 501
59.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, pp. 512–516
60.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, p. 522
61.^ Jump up to: a b Gill 1778, p. 531
62.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, pp. 535–536
63.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, pp. 536–537
64.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, p. 544
65.Jump up ^ Gill 1778, p. 499
66.Jump up ^ One of the definitions of "tittle" in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary is "a point or small sign used as a diacritical mark in writing or printing".
67.Jump up ^ pg. 110, Of the Integrity and Purity of the Hebrew and Greek Text of the Scripture; with Considerations on the Prolegomena and Appendix to the Late “Biblia Polyglotta,” in vol. IX, The Works of John Owen, ed. Gould, William H, & Quick, Charles W., Philadelphia, PA: Leighton Publications, 1865)
68.Jump up ^ For the meanings of the word κεραία in the original texts of Matthew 5:18 and Luke 16:17 see Liddell and Scott and for a more modern scholarly view of its meaning in that context see Strong's Greek Dictionary.
69.Jump up ^ "Search => [word] => tittle :: 1828 Dictionary :: Search the 1828 Noah Webster's Dictionary of the English Language (FREE)". 1828.mshaffer.com. 2009-10-16. Retrieved 2013-03-26.
70.Jump up ^ Jewish Virtual Library: Vowels and Points
71.Jump up ^ At Home with Hebrew
72.Jump up ^ Page H. Kenney, Biblical Hebrew: an introductory grammar 1992
73.Jump up ^ Old Testament Manuscripts
74.Jump up ^ James C. VanderKam, The Dead Sea Scrolls Today, p. 30
75.Jump up ^ The Dead Sea Scrolls Biblical Manuscripts
76.Jump up ^ The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Graphological Investigation
77.Jump up ^ William P. Griffin, Killing a Dead Language: A Case against Emphasizing Vowel Pointing when Teaching Biblical Hebrew
78.Jump up ^ The Dead Sea Scrolls: A College Textbook and a Study Guide, pp. 75-76
79.Jump up ^ Godfrey Higgins, On the Vowel Points of the Hebrew Language, in The Classical Journal for March and June 1826, p. 145
80.Jump up ^ Higgins, pp. 146-149
81.Jump up ^ Augustin Calmet, Dictionary of the Bible, pp. 618-619
82.Jump up ^ B. Pick, The Vowel-Points Controversy in the XVI. and XVII. Centuries
83.Jump up ^ See Gérard Gertoux, The name of God Y.EH.OW.AH which is pronounced as it is written I_EH_OU_AH, pp. 209, 210.
84.Jump up ^ See page 8
85.Jump up ^ Smith commented, "In the decade of dissertations collected by Reland, Fuller, Gataker, and Leusden do battle for the pronunciation Jehovah, against such formidable antagonists as Drusius, Amama, Cappellus, Buxtorf, and Altingius, who, it is scarcely necessary to say, fairly beat their opponents out of the field; "the only argument of any weight, which is employed by the advocates of the pronunciation of the word as it is written being that derived from the form in which it appears in proper names, such as Jehoshaphat, Jehoram, &c. [...] Their antagonists make a strong point of the fact that, as has been noticed above, two different sets of vowel points are applied to the same consonants under certain circumstances. To this Leusden, of all the champions on his side, but feebly replies. [...] The same may be said of the argument derived from the fact that the letters מוכלב, when prefixed to יהוה, take, not the vowels which they would regularly receive were the present pronunciation true, but those with which they would be written if אֲדֹנָי, adonai, were the reading; and that the letters ordinarily taking dagesh lene when following יהוה would, according to the rules of the Hebrew points, be written without dagesh, whereas it is uniformly inserted."
86.Jump up ^ Image of it.
87.Jump up ^ Introduction to the Old Testament of the New English Bible
88.Jump up ^ Revised New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures. Accessed 14 October 2013.
89.Jump up ^ Of the 78 passages where the New Testament, using Κύριος (Lord) for the Tetragrammaton of the Hebrew text, quotes an Old Testament passage, the New World Translation puts "Jehovah" for Κύριος in 70 instances, "God" for Κύριος in 5 (Rom 11:2, 8; Gal 1:15; Heb 9:20; 1 Pet 4:14), and "Lord" for Κύριος in 3 (2 Thes 1:9; 1 Pet 2:3, 3:15) – Jason BeDuhn, Truth in Translation (University Press of America 2003 ISBN 0-7618-2556-8), pp. 174-175
90.Jump up ^ Rheims Douai, 1582-1610: a machine-readable transcript
91.Jump up ^ Douay-Rheims Bible
92.Jump up ^ Preface to the Revised Standard Version
93.Jump up ^ New American Bible, Genesis, Chapter 4
94.Jump up ^ Foreword and Preface to the New American Standard Bible
95.Jump up ^ John W. Gillis, The HCSB 2nd Edition and the Tetragrammaton
96.Jump up ^ How does the WEB compare to other translations?
97.Jump up ^ See CivicHeraldry.co.uk -Plymouth and here [12]. Also, Civic Heraldry of the United Kingdom)
98.Jump up ^ e.g. "Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah" (1771)
99.Jump up ^ Full text of "The Greatest Story Ever Told A Tale Of The Greatest Life Ever Lived" - Internet Archive - Retrieved 2 September 2011.
100.Jump up ^ "How God's Name Has Been Made Known". Awake!: 20. December 2007. "The commonly used form of God’s name in English is Jehovah, translated from the Hebrew [Tetragrammaton], which appears some 7,000 times in the Bible."
101.^ Jump up to: a b Charles William King, The Gnostics and their remains: Ancient and Mediaeval (1887), p. 285
102.Jump up ^ He speaks of it as anonymous: "the writer 'On Interpretations'". Aristotle's De Interpretatione does not speak of Egyptians.
103.Jump up ^ Charles William King, The Gnostics and their remains: Ancient and Mediaeval (1887), pp. 199-200.
104.Jump up ^ Praeparatio evangelica 10.9.
105.Jump up ^ The Grecised Hebrew text "εληιε Ιεωα ρουβα" is interpreted as meaning "my God Ieoa is mightier". ("La prononciation 'Jehova' du tétragramme", O.T.S. vol. 5, 1948, pp. 57, 58. [Greek papyrus CXXI 1.528-540 (3rd century), Library of the British Museum]
106.Jump up ^ Article in the Aster magazine (January 2000), the official periodical of the Greek Evangelical Church.
107.Jump up ^ Greek translation by Ioannes Stanos.
108.Jump up ^ Published by the British and Foreign Bible Society.
109.Jump up ^ Exodus 6:3, etc.
110.Jump up ^ Dogmatike tes Orthodoxou Katholikes Ekklesias (Dogmatics of the Orthodox Catholic Church), 3rd ed., 1997 (c. 1958), Vol. 1, p. 229.
111.^ Jump up to: a b c Pugio Fidei, in which Martin argued that the vowel points were added to the Hebrew text only in the 10th century (Thomas D. Ross, The Battle over the Hebrew Vowel Points Examined Particularly as Waged in England, p. 5).
112.Jump up ^ Dahlia M. Karpman, "Tyndale's Response to the Hebraic Tradition" (Studies in the Renaissance, Vol. 14 (1967)), p. 121.
113.^ Jump up to: a b See comments at Exodus 6:2, 3 in his Critical Remarks on the Hebrew Scriptures (1800).
114.Jump up ^ Rev. Richard Barrett's A Synopsis of Criticisms upon Passages of the Old Testament (1847) p. 219.
115.Jump up ^ Gérard Gertoux, The name of God Y.eH.oW.aH which is pronounced as it is written I_EH_OU_AH, page 152; a photo of a bilingual Latin (or Spanish) text and Hebrew text [side by side] written by Raymond Martin in 1278, with in its last sentence "יְהוָֹה" opposite "Yohoua".
116.^ Jump up to: a b Victory Against the Ungodly Hebrews. Gérard Gertoux, The name of God Y.eH.oW.aH, p. 153.
117.Jump up ^ [13]; George Moore, Notes on the Name YHWH (The American Journal of Theology, Vol. 12, No. 1. (Jan., 1908), pp. 34-52.
118.Jump up ^ Charles IX of Sweden instituted the Royal Order of Jehova in 1606.
119.^ Jump up to: a b c Scholia in Vetus Testamentum, vol. 3, part 3, pp. 8, 9, etc.
120.Jump up ^ For example, Gesenius rendered Proverbs 8:22 in Latin as: "Jehova creavit me ab initio creationis". (Samuel Lee, A lexicon, Hebrew, Chaldee, and English (1840) p. 143)
121.Jump up ^ "Non enim h quatuor liter [yhwh] si, ut punctat sunt, legantur, Ioua reddunt: sed (ut ipse optime nosti) Iehoua efficiunt." (De Arcanis Catholicæ Veritatis (1518), folio xliii. See Oxford English Dictionary Online, 1989/2008, Oxford University Press, "Jehovah"). Peter Galatin was Pope Leo X's confessor.
122.Jump up ^ Sir Godfrey Driver, Introduction to the Old Testament of the New English Bible.
123.Jump up ^ See Poole's comments at Exodus 6:2, 3 in his Synopsis criticorum biblicorum.
124.Jump up ^ The State of the printed Hebrew Text of the Old Testament considered: A Dissertation in two parts (1753), pp. 158, 159)
125.Jump up ^ The First Twelve Psalms in Hebrew, p. 22.
References
##Gill, John (1778). "A Dissertation Concerning the Antiquity of the Hebrew Language, Letters, Vowel-Points, and Accents". A collection of sermons and tracts ...: To which are prefixed, memoirs of the life, writing, and character of the author 3. G. Keith.
External links
 Wikiquote has quotations related to: Jehovah
## "Tetragrammaton". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). 1911.
## "Jehovah". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). 1911.
##Wikisource-logo.svg "Jehovah". New International Encyclopedia. 1905.
##"Jehovah (Yahweh)", Catholic Encyclopedia 1910
##"Tetragrammaton", Jewish Encyclopedia 1906


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Yahweh

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 A drachm (quarter shekel) coin from the Persian province of Yehud, apparently showing the god YHW (Yahweh) as a bearded man seated on a winged and wheeled throne.[1]This article is about the national god of the Iron Age kingdoms of Israel and Judah. For other uses, see Yahweh (disambiguation). See also: Tetragrammaton, Jehovah, and God in Abrahamic religions
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Yahweh (/ˈjɑːhweɪ/, or often /ˈjɑːweɪ/ in English; Hebrew: יהוה‎) was the national god of the kingdoms of Israel and the Judah.[2] His origins are debated but there is widespread acceptance that he did not originate with Israel.[3] His name may have begun as an epithet of El, head of the Bronze Age Canaanite pantheon,[4] but the earliest plausible references to it place him among the nomads of the southern Transjordan.[5]
In the oldest biblical literature Yahweh is a typical ancient Near Eastern "divine warrior" who leads the heavenly army against Israel's enemies.[6] He became the main god of the northern Kingdom of Israel and patron of its royal dynasty.[7] Over time, Yahwism became increasingly intolerant of rivals, and the royal court and temple promoted Yahweh as the god of the entire cosmos, possessing all the positive qualities previously attributed to the other gods and goddesses.[8][9] With the work of Second Isaiah (the theoretical author of the second part of the Book of Isaiah) towards the end of the Babylonian exile (6th century BC), the very existence of foreign gods was denied, and Yahweh was proclaimed as the creator of the cosmos and the true god of all the world.[9]


Contents  [hide]
1 Origins
2 Yahweh and the gods of Canaan
3 Yahwism in Israel (Samaria) and Judah, c.930–580 BCE 3.1 Yahweh as national god (God of Israel)
3.2 Worship (temples, sacrifice, etc)
3.3 Relationship to other gods and goddesses
3.4 Monotheism
4 See also
5 Notes
6 References 6.1 Citations
6.2 Bibliography


Origins[edit]
See also: Tetragrammaton, Jehovah and Names of God in Judaism


The Tetragrammaton in Phoenician alphabet (10th century BC to 135 AD), Paleo-Hebrew (10th century BC to 4th century AD) and square Hebrew (3rd century BC to present) scripts. NOTE: Hebrew is written from right to left.
Yahweh appears to have been unique to the two kingdoms of Israel and Judah.[10] He may have originated as a title for El, the head of the Canaanite pantheon (el dū yahwī ṣaba’ôt, "El who creates the hosts", meaning the heavenly army accompanying El as he marched beside the earthly armies of Israel), but although El and Yahweh have much in common they also have many differences.[11] The more probable explanation is that Yahweh originated as a storm-god from regions south of Israel and Judah.[12] Further support for the southern hypothesis comes from Egyptian inscriptions that mention a "land of the Shasu Yahu", the Shasu being nomads from the region of Midian and Edom and Yahu (or more accurately, YHW) a place name; there is considerable acceptance among scholars that YHW refers to the name Yahweh.[13]
If Yahweh originated in the deserts south of Israel, the question that arises is how he made his way to the north.[14] A widely accepted hypothesis (called the Kenite hypothesis, after one of the groups involved) is that traders brought Yahweh to Israel along the caravan routes between Egypt and Canaan.[15] The strength of this hypothesis is the way it ties together various points of data, such as the absence of Yahweh from Canaan, his links with Edom and Midian in the biblical stories, and the Kenite or Midianite ties of Moses.[16]
Yahweh and the gods of Canaan[edit]
Scholars agree that the Israelite community arose peacefully and internally in the highlands of Canaan[17]–in the words of archaeologist William Dever, "most of those who came to call themselves Israelites … were or had been indigenous Canaanites"–[18][Notes 1] and that Israelite religion accordingly emerged gradually from a Canaanite milieu.[19]
El, not Yahweh, was the original "God of Israel"–the word "Israel" is based on the name El rather than Yahweh.[20] He was the chief of the Canaanite gods, described as "the kind, the compassionate," "the creator of creatures".[21] He lived in a tent on a mountain from whose base originated all the fresh waters of the world, from where he presided over the Assembly of the Gods with the goddess Asherah as his consort.[21][22] The pair made up the top tier of the Canaanite pantheon;[21] the second tier was made up of their children, the "seventy sons of Athirat" (another name of Asherah).[23] Prominent in this group was Baal, with his home on Mount Zaphon; he gradually became the dominant deity, so that El became the executive power and Baal the military power in the cosmos.[24] Baal's sphere was the thunderstorm with its life-giving rains, so that he was also a fertility god, although not quite the fertility god.[25] The third tier was made up of comparatively minor craftsman and trader deities, and the fourth and final tier of divine messengers and the like.[23] Yahweh, the southern warrior-god, joined the pantheon headed by El and in time he and El were identified, with El's name becoming a generic term for "god".[22] Each member of the divine council had a human nation under his care, and a textual variant of Deuteronomy 32:8–9 describes the sons of El, including Yahweh, each receiving his own people:[20]
When the Most High (Elyon, i.e., El) gave the nations their inheritanceWhen he separated humanityHe fixed the boundaries of the peoplesaccording to the number of divine beings;For Yahweh's portion is his peopleJacob his allotted heritage.[Notes 2]
Yahwism in Israel (Samaria) and Judah, c.930–580 BCE[edit]
Yahweh as national god (God of Israel)[edit]
Israel emerges into the historical record in the last decades of the 13th century BCE, at the very end of the Late Bronze Age, as the Cannanite city-state system was ending.[26] By the 9th century BCE a new system of nation-states was forming (Israel, Judah, Moab, Ammon and others), marked by, among other things, the emergence of national gods.[27] What distinguished Israel from other emerging Iron Age Canaanite societies was its elevation of Yahweh as the national god, rather than, for example, Chemosh, the god of Moab, or Moloch, the god of the Ammonites.[28]
According to the Hebrew Bible Israel began in the 10th century as a united kingdom ruled by David and his son Solomon before splitting into the two separate states of Judah and Israel.[29] Since the 1980s scholars have reassessed this picture and now believe that a significant northern kingdom emerged only in the 9th century BCE, while Judah emerged as a state only in the 8th.[30][31]
Israel was as one of a number of regional kingdoms which crystallised along the trade route between Egypt and Mesopotamia at the close of the Bronze Age, all of which seem to have adopted a national god.[32] The gods came to represent their nations, and stood more or less equal to each other–Chemosh, for example, represented Moab just as Yahweh represented Israel.[33] The idea that the worship of Yahweh as national god played a key role in the formation of the monarchic state remains common among scholars, but the evidence is in fact slender—for example, none of the patriarchs, tribes, or early kings has a name based on Yahweh.[34] We do not know what god the earliest kings worshiped, but from the mid-9th century the court cult in Israel (meaning the northern kingdom) was definitely linked to Yahweh, and same applied to Judah from the time of king Jehoshaphat, a close ally of the king of Israel.[35]
It was in Samaria that Yahweh had the title "God of Israel"–no "God of Judah" is mentioned anywhere in the Bible–[36] and the name "Israel" appears to have taken on an ideological role in Judah after the fall of Samaria to the Assyrians in c.720 BCE, with Judah cast as the "true" Israel.[37]
The emergence of the monarchic state involved the concentration of power through kingship.[38] The king used national religion to exert his authority,[9] and as head of the state was also the head of the national religion and God's viceroy on Earth.[39]
Worship (temples, sacrifice, etc)[edit]
The Hebrew Bible gives the impression that the temple in Jerusalem was the most important or even sole temple of Yahweh, but this was not the case.[40] The earliest known Israelite place of worship is a 12th-century open-air altar in the hills of Samaria featuring a bronze bull reminiscent of Canaanite "Bull-El" (El in the form of a bull), and the archaeological remains of further temples have been found at Dan on Israel's northern border, at Arad in the Negev, and at Beersheba (both in the territory of Judah);[41] the evidence of the Biblical texts indicates further that Shiloh, Bethel, Gilgal, Mizpah, Ramah and Dan were major sites for festivals, sacrifices, making of vows, private rituals and the adjudication of legal disputes.[42]
Several peoples in ancient Syria and Palestine, including the Israelites, had cults focused on standing stones rather than on an image of their god, and it is probable that the earliest Yahweh-worshipers followed this tradition.[43] Later practice was mixed: the temple at Arad had standing stones, but the temple in Jerusalem famously had a throne in the form of two cherubim, their inner wings forming the seat and a box (the Ark of the Covenant) as a footstool.[44] According to Deuteronomy 10:1-5 and 1 Kings 8:9,21 this contained the Tablets of the Law, but in fact the two stones may have been standing-stones representing Yahweh and Asherah.[44] The northern kingdom, following the Canaanite El tradition, may have worshiped Yahweh in the form of a bull.
Each year the king presided over a ceremony in which Yahweh was enthroned in the Temple,[45] and the centre of his worship lay in three great annual festivals coinciding with major events in rural life: Passover with the birthing of lambs, Shavuot with the cereal harvest, and Sukkot with the fruit harvest.[46] These probably pre-dated the arrival of the Yahweh religion,[46] but became linked to events in the invented national history of Israel: Passover with the exodus from Egypt, Shavuot with the law-giving at Sinai, and Sukkot with the wilderness wanderings.[40] The festivals thus celebrated Yahweh's salvation of Israel and Israel's status as his holy people, although the earlier agricultural meaning was not entirely lost.[47]
Yahweh's worship presumably involved sacrifice, but many scholars have concluded that the rituals detailed in Leviticus 1-16, with their stress on purity and atonement, were introduced only after the Babylonian exile, and that in reality any head of a family was able to offer sacrifice as occasion demanded.[48] (A number of scholars have also drawn the conclusion that infant sacrifice, whether to the underworld deity Molech or to Yahweh himself, was a part of Israelite/Judahite religion until the reforms of King Josiah in the late 7th century BCE).[49] Sacrifice was presumably complemented by the singing or recital of psalms on occasions varying from royal and public to communal and personal, but again the details are scant.[50] Prayer played little role in official worship.[51]
Everything in the moral realm was understood in relation to Yahweh as a manifestation of holiness. Divine law protected family relationships and the welfare of the weaker members of society; purity of conduct, dress, food, etc. were regulated. Religious leadership resided in priests who were associated with sanctuaries, and also in prophets, who were bearers of divine oracles. In the political sphere the king was understood as the appointee and agent of Yahweh.[52]
Relationship to other gods and goddesses[edit]
The Hebrew Bible provides evidence that many gods other than Yahweh were worshiped in Israel and Judah–for example, when King Josiah reformed Jerusalem's religious practice in the late 7th century, places of worship for other gods around Jerusalem had to be destroyed, priests had to be stopped from burning incense to Baal and the sun and moon and the "host of heaven," and Yahweh's own temple had to be purged of Baal, Asherah, the Host of Heaven, the chariots of the sun, and more.[53]
Yahweh and El merged at religious centres such as Shechem, Shiloh and Jerusalem, and the priesthood of Yahweh inherited the religious lore of El.[54] Yahweh appropriated many of the older supreme god's titles such as El Shaddai (El of the Mountains) and El Elyon (El Almighty), but Yahwism did not absorb the bull cult associated with El, and the rejection of the golden calf of Aaron and the bulls of Jeroboam was fundamental to the Israelite self-understanding as expressed in the biblical scriptures.
Yahweh's appearances as a storm god owe much to Canaanite depictions of Baal.[55] Baal and Yahweh coexisted in the early period of Israel's history, but from the 9th century they were considered irreconcilable, probably as a result of the attempts of King Ahab and Jezebel, his Phoenician queen, to elevate him in the northern kingdom.[56]
Goddesses worshiped in Israel and Judah included Asherah, Astarte, and a deity called the Queen of Heaven, who was probably a fusion of Astarte and the Mesopotamian goddess Ishtar.[57] Evidence increasingly suggests Asherah, formerly the wife of El, was worshiped as Yahweh's consort, and various biblical passages indicate that her statues were kept in his temples in Jerusalem, Bethel, and Samaria.[57] Yahweh may also have appropriated Anat, the wife of Baal, as his consort, as Anat-Yahu ("Anat of Yahu," i.e., Yahweh) is mentioned in 5th century records from the Jewish colony at Elephantine in Egypt.[58]
There is evidence also of the worship of further gods and goddesses from the Canaanite pantheon, such as the "Queen of Heaven" mentioned in Jeremiah who might be Astarte (also known as Ishtar,[59] Both the archaeological evidence and the biblical texts document tensions between groups comfortable with the worship of Yahweh alongside local deities such as Asherah and Baal and those insistent on worship of Yahweh alone during the monarchical period (1 Kings 18, Jeremiah 2)[60][61] The Deuteronomistic source gives evidence of a strong monotheistic party during the reign of king Josiah during the late 7th century BCE, but the strength and prevalence of earlier monotheistic worship of Yahweh is widely debated based on interpretations of how much of the Deuteronomistic history is accurately based on earlier sources, and how much Deuteronomistic redactors have re-worked that history to bolster their own theological views.[62] The archaeological record documents widespread polytheism in and around Israel during the period of the monarchy.[60]
Traditional scholarship distinguished "orthodox Yahwism"–the worship of Yahweh alone by the elite–from heterodox popular and family religion,[63][64] but there was in fact no authority deciding what was orthodox and what was not, and Yahweh was probably only one among many objects of veneration.[65] Orthodox or "normative" Yahwism did not exist in either Israel or Judah for most of the monarchical period.[66]
Monotheism[edit]
Scholars agree that Israelite monotheism was the culmination of a unique set of historical circumstances.[67] Pre-exilic Israel, like its neighbours, was polytheistic; the worship of Yahweh alone began at the earliest with Elijah in the 9th century BCE, but more likely with the prophet Hosea in the 8th; even then it remained the concern of a small party (with the brief exception of a period of royal support under Josiah), before gaining ascendancy in the exilic and early post-exilic period.[68] The process by which this came about might be described as follows: In the early tribal period each tribe would have had its own patron god; the Israelite state, when kingship emerged, promoted Yahweh as the "God of Israel," supreme over the other gods, and gradually Yahweh absorbed all the positive traits of the other gods and goddesses; finally, in the national crisis of the exile, the very existence of other gods was denied.[9]
The fifth century Elephantine papyri were written by a group of Egyptian Jews living at Elephantine near the Nubian border, and witness a religion that has been described as "nearly identical to Iron Age II Judahite religion".[69] The papyri describe these Jews as worshiping Anat-Yahu (or AnatYahu), either the wife of Yahweh or as a hypostatized aspect of the god.[58][70][71] "Even in exile and beyond, the veneration of a female deity endured."[72]
See also[edit]
Adonai
Ancient Semitic religion
Canaanite religion
God
God in Abrahamic religions
Jehovah
Kyrios
Sacred Name Movement
the seven names of God
Notes[edit]
1.Jump up ^ Canaanites in this article means the indigenous Bronze Age and early Iron Age inhabitants of southern Syria, the coast of Lebanon, Israel, the West Bank and Jordan. – Dever, 2002, p.219
2.Jump up ^ For the varying texts of this verse, see Smith, 2012, pp.139-140 and also chapter 4.
References[edit]
Citations[edit]
1.Jump up ^ Edelman 1995, p. 190.
2.Jump up ^ Miller 1986, p. 110.
3.Jump up ^ Grabbe 2007, p. 153.
4.Jump up ^ Dijkstra 2001, p. 92.
5.Jump up ^ Dever 2003, p. 128.
6.Jump up ^ Hackett 2001, p. 158–159.
7.Jump up ^ Smith 2002, p. 72.
8.Jump up ^ Wyatt 2010, p. 69–70.
9.^ Jump up to: a b c d Betz 2000, p. 917.
10.Jump up ^ Grabbe 2010, p. 184.
11.Jump up ^ Chalmers 2012, p. no pagination.
12.Jump up ^ Smith 2000, p. 384-385.
13.Jump up ^ Grabbe 2007, p. 151,153.
14.Jump up ^ Van Der Toorn 1999, p. 912.
15.Jump up ^ Van Der Toorn 1999, p. 912-913.
16.Jump up ^ Van Der Toorn 2010, p. 247-248.
17.Jump up ^ Gnuse 1997, p. 31.
18.Jump up ^ Dever 2003, p. 228.
19.Jump up ^ Cook 2004, p. 7.
20.^ Jump up to: a b Smith 2002, p. 32.
21.^ Jump up to: a b c Coogan & Smith 2012, p. 8.
22.^ Jump up to: a b Smith 2002, p. 33.
23.^ Jump up to: a b Hess 2007, p. 103.
24.Jump up ^ Coogan & Smith 2012, p. 7–8.
25.Jump up ^ Handy 1994, p. 101.
26.Jump up ^ Noll 2001, p. 124–126.
27.Jump up ^ Schniedewind 2013, p. 93.
28.Jump up ^ Hackett 2001, p. 156.
29.Jump up ^ Moore & Kelle 2011, p. 266.
30.Jump up ^ Niehr 1995, p. 53.
31.Jump up ^ Moore & Kelle 2011, p. 268.
32.Jump up ^ Halpern & Adams 2009, p. 26.
33.Jump up ^ Smith 2010, p. 119–120.
34.Jump up ^ Moore & Kelle 2011, p. 126–127.
35.Jump up ^ Levin 2013, p. 247.
36.Jump up ^ Davies 2010, p. 107.
37.Jump up ^ Wyatt 2010, p. 61, footnote 1.
38.Jump up ^ Meyers 2001, p. 166–168.
39.Jump up ^ Miller 2000, p. 90.
40.^ Jump up to: a b Davies 2012, p. 112.
41.Jump up ^ Dever 2003a, p. 388.
42.Jump up ^ Bennett 2002, p. 83.
43.Jump up ^ Mettinger 2006, p. 288-289.
44.^ Jump up to: a b Mettinger 2006, p. 290.
45.Jump up ^ Petersen 1998, p. 23.
46.^ Jump up to: a b Albertz 1994, p. 89.
47.Jump up ^ Gorman 2000, p. 458.
48.Jump up ^ Davies & Rogerson 2005, p. 151-152.
49.Jump up ^ Gnuse 1997, p. 118.
50.Jump up ^ Davies & Rogerson 2005, p. 158-165.
51.Jump up ^ Cohen 1999, p. 302.
52.Jump up ^ Miller 2000, p. 50–51.
53.Jump up ^ Collins 2005, p. 101–102.
54.Jump up ^ Smith 2001, p. 140.
55.Jump up ^ Collins 2005, p. 101-102.
56.Jump up ^ Smith 2002, p. 47.
57.^ Jump up to: a b Ackerman 2003, p. 395.
58.^ Jump up to: a b Day 2002, p. 143.
59.Jump up ^ Dever 2005, p. 234.
60.^ Jump up to: a b & Keel 1998, p. not defined.
61.Jump up ^ Smith 2001, p. not defined.
62.Jump up ^ Smith 2001, p. 151–154.
63.Jump up ^ Collins 2005, p. 122-123.
64.Jump up ^ Darby 2014, p. 50.
65.Jump up ^ Bennett 2002, p. 84.
66.Jump up ^ Ahlstrom 1991, p. 140.
67.Jump up ^ Gnuse 2006, p. 129.
68.Jump up ^ Albertz 1994, p. 61.
69.Jump up ^ Noll 2001, p. 248.
70.Jump up ^ Niehr 1995, p. 58.
71.Jump up ^ Ackerman 2003, p. 394.
72.Jump up ^ Gnuse 1997, p. 185.
Bibliography[edit]
Ackerman, Susan (2003). "Goddesses". In Richard, Suzanne. Near Eastern Archaeology:A Reader. Eisenbrauns. ISBN 978-1-57506-083-5.
Ahlstrom, Gosta W. (1991). "The Role of Archaeological and Literary Remains in Reconstructing Israel's History". In Edelman, Diana Vikander. The Fabric of History: Text, Artifact and Israel's Past. A&C Black.
Albertz, Rainer (1994). A History of Israelite Religion, Volume I: From the Beginnings to the End of the Monarchy. Westminster John Knox.
Becking, Bob (2001). "The Gods in Whom They Trusted". In Becking, Bob. Only One God?: Monotheism in Ancient Israel and the Veneration of the Goddess Asherah. A&C Black.
Bennett, Harold V. (2002). Injustice Made Legal: Deuteronomic Law and the Plight of Widows, Strangers, and Orphans in Ancient Israel. Eerdmans.
Betz, Arnold Gottfried (2000). "Monotheism". In Freedman, David Noel; Myer, Allen C. Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible. Eerdmans. ISBN 9053565035.
Chalmers, Aaron (2012). Exploring the Religion of Ancient Israel: Prophet, Priest, Sage and People. SPCK.
Cohen, Shaye J.D. (1999). "The Temple and the Synagogue". In Finkelstein, Louis; Davies, W. D.; Horbury, William. The Cambridge History of Judaism: Volume 3, The Early Roman Period. Cambridge University Press.
Cohn, Norman (2001). Cosmos, Chaos, and the World to Come: The Ancient Roots of Apocalyptic Faith. Yale University Press.
Collins, John J. (2005). The Bible After Babel: Historical Criticism in a Postmodern Age. Eerdmans.
Coogan, Michael D.; Smith, Mark S. (2012). Stories from Ancient Canaan (2nd Edition). Presbyterian Publishing Corp. ISBN 9053565035.
Cook, Stephen L. (2004). The Social Roots of Biblical Yahwism. Society of Biblical Literature.
Darby, Erin (2014). Interpreting Judean Pillar Figurines: Gender and Empire in Judean Apotropaic Ritual. Mohr Siebeck.
Davies, Philip R.; Rogerson, John (2005). The Old Testament World. Westminster John Knox.
Davies, Philip R. (2010). "Urban Religion and Rural Religion". In Stavrakopoulou, Francesca; Barton, John. Religious Diversity in Ancient Israel and Judah. Continuum International Publishing Group.
Day, John (2002). Yahweh and the Gods and Goddesses of Canaan. Continuum.
Dever, William G. (2003a). "Religion and Cult in the Levant". In Richard, Suzanne. Near Eastern Archaeology:A Reader. Eisenbrauns. ISBN 978-1-57506-083-5.
Dever, William G. (2003b). Who Were the Early Israelites and Where Did They Come From. Eerdmans.
Dever, William G. (2005). Did God Have A Wife?: Archaeology And Folk Religion In Ancient Israel. Eerdmans. ISBN 978-0-8028-2852-1.
Dijkstra, Meindert (2001). "El the God of Israel-Israel the People of YHWH: On the Origins of Ancient Israelite Yahwism". In Becking, Bob; Dijkstra, Meindert; Korpel, Marjo C.A. et al. Only One God?: Monotheism in Ancient Israel and the Veneration of the Goddess Asherah. A&C Black.
Edelman, Diana V. (1995). "Tracking Observance of the Aniconic Tradition". In Edelman, Diana Vikander. The Triumph of Elohim: From Yahwisms to Judaisms. Peeters Publishers. ISBN 9053565035.
Elior, Rachel (2006). "Early Forms of Jewish Mysticism". In Katz, Steven T. The Cambridge History of Judaism: The Late Roman-Rabbinic Period. Cambridge University Press.
Gnuse, Robert Karl (1997). No Other Gods: Emergent Monotheism in Israel. Continuum.
Gorman, Frank H., Jr. (2000). "Feasts, Festivals". In Freedman, David Noel; Myers, Allen C. Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible. Amsterdam University Press. ISBN 978-1-57506-083-5.
Finkelstein, Israel; Silberman, Neil Asher (2002). The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology's New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Sacred Texts. Simon and Schuster.
Frerichs, Ernest S. (1998). The Bible and Bibles in America. Scholars Press.
Gnuse, Robert (1999). "The Emergence of Monotheism in Ancient Israel: A Survey of Recent Scholarship". Religion 29: 315–336.
Grabbe, Lester (2010). "'Many nations will be joined to YHWH in that day': The question of YHWH outside Judah". In Stavrakopoulou, Francesca; Barton, John. Religious diversity in Ancient Israel and Judah. Continuum International Publishing Group. ISBN 978-0-567-03216-4.
Grabbe, Lester (2007). Ancient Israel: What Do We Know and How Do We Know It?. A&C Black.
Hackett, Jo Ann (2001). "'There Was No King In Israel': The Era of the Judges". In Coogan, Michael David. The Oxford History of the Biblical World. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-513937-2.
Halpern, Baruch; Adams, Matthew J. (2009). From Gods to God: The Dynamics of Iron Age Cosmologies. Mohr Siebeck.
Handy, Lowell K. (1995). Among the Host of Heaven: The Syro-Palestinian Pantheon as Bureaucracy. Eisenbrauns.
Hess, Richard S. (2007). Israelite Religions: An Archaeological and Biblical Survey. Baker Academic.
Humphries, W. Lee (1990). "God, Names of". In Bullard, Roger Aubrey. Mercer Dictionary of the Bible. Mercer University Press.
Keel, Othmar (1997). The Symbolism of the Biblical World: Ancient Near Eastern Iconography and the Book of Psalms. Eisenbrauns.
Levin, Christoph (2013). Re-Reading the Scriptures: Essays on the Literary History of the Old Testament. Mohr Siebeck.
Liverani, Mario (2014). Israel's History and the History of Israel. Routledge. ISBN 978-1317488934.
Mafico, Temba L.J. (1992). "The Divine Name Yahweh Alohim from an African Perspective". In Segovia, Fernando F.; Tolbert, Mary Ann. Reading from this Place: Social Location and Biblical Interpretation in Global Perspective 2. Fortress Press.
Mastin, B.A. (2005). "Yahweh's Asherah, Inclusive Monotheism and the Question of Dating". In Day, John. In Search of Pre-Exilic Israel. Bloomsbury.
Mettinger, Tryggve N.D. (2006). "A Conversation With My Critics: Cultic Image or Aniconism in the First Temple?". In Amit, Yaira; Naʼaman, Nadav. Essays on Ancient Israel in Its Near Eastern Context. Eisenbrauns.
Meyers, Carol (2001). "Kinship and Kingship: The early Monarchy". In Coogan, Michael David. The Oxford History of the Biblical World. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-513937-2.
McDonald, Nathan (2007). "Aniconism in the Old Testament". In Gordon, R.P. The God of Israel. Cambridge University Press.
Miller, Patrick D (2000). The Religion of Ancient Israel. Westminster John Knox Press. ISBN 978-0-664-22145-4.
Miller, Patrick D (1986). A History of Ancient Israel and Judah. Westminster John Knox Press.
Moore, Megan Bishop; Kelle, Brad E. (2011). Biblical History and Israel's Past: The Changing Study of the Bible and History. Eerdmans.
Niehr, Herbert (1995). "The Rise of YHWH in Judahite and Israelite Religion". In Edelman, Diana Vikander. The Triumph of Elohim: From Yahwisms to Judaisms. Peeters Publishers. ISBN 9053565035.
Noll, K.L. (2001). Canaan and Israel in Antiquity: An Introduction. A&C Black.
Petersen, Allan Rosengren (1998). The Royal God: Enthronement Festivals in Ancient Israel and Ugarit?. A&C Black.
Schniedewind, William M. (2013). A Social History of Hebrew: Its Origins Through the Rabbinic Period. Yale University Press.
Smith, Mark S. (2000). "El". In Freedman, David Noel; Myer, Allen C. Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible. Eerdmans.
Smith, Mark S. (2001). The Origins of Biblical Monotheism: Israel's Polytheistic Background and the Ugaritic Texts. Oxford University Press.
Smith, Mark S. (2002). The Early History of God: Yahweh and the Other Deities in Ancient Israel. Eerdmans.
Smith, Mark S. (2003). "Astral Religion and the Divinity". In Noegel, Scott; Walker, Joel. Prayer, Magic, and the Stars in the Ancient and Late Antique World. Penn State Press.
Smith, Mark S. (2010). God in Translation: Deities in Cross-Cultural Discourse in the Biblical World. Eerdmans.
Smith, Morton (1984). "Jewish Religious Life in the Persian Period". In Finkelstein, Louis. The Cambridge History of Judaism: Volume 1, Introduction: The Persian Period. Cambridge University Press.
Sommer, Benjamin D. (2011). "God, names of". In Berlin, Adele; Grossman, Maxine L. The Oxford Dictionary of the Jewish Religion. Oxford University Press.
Van Der Toorn, Karel (1995). "Ritual Resistance and Self-Assertion". In Platvoet, Jan. G.; Van Der Toorn, Karel. Pluralism and Identity: Studies in Ritual Behaviour. BRILL.
Van Der Toorn, Karel (1999). "Yahweh". In Van Der Toorn, Karel; Becking, Bob; van der Horst, Pieter Willem. Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible. Eerdmans.
Van Der Toorn, Karel (1996). Family Religion in Babylonia, Ugarit and Israel: Continuity and Changes in the Forms of Religious Life. BRILL.
Wright, J. Edward (2002). The Early History of Heaven. Oxford University Press.
Wyatt, Nicolas (2010). "Royal Religion in Ancient Judah". In Stavrakopoulou, Francesca; Barton, John. Religious Diversity in Ancient Israel and Judah. Continuum International Publishing Group. ISBN 978-0-567-03216-4.


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 A drachm (quarter shekel) coin from the Persian province of Yehud, apparently showing the god YHW (Yahweh) as a bearded man seated on a winged and wheeled throne.[1]This article is about the national god of the Iron Age kingdoms of Israel and Judah. For other uses, see Yahweh (disambiguation). See also: Tetragrammaton, Jehovah, and God in Abrahamic religions
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Yahweh (/ˈjɑːhweɪ/, or often /ˈjɑːweɪ/ in English; Hebrew: יהוה‎) was the national god of the kingdoms of Israel and the Judah.[2] His origins are debated but there is widespread acceptance that he did not originate with Israel.[3] His name may have begun as an epithet of El, head of the Bronze Age Canaanite pantheon,[4] but the earliest plausible references to it place him among the nomads of the southern Transjordan.[5]
In the oldest biblical literature Yahweh is a typical ancient Near Eastern "divine warrior" who leads the heavenly army against Israel's enemies.[6] He became the main god of the northern Kingdom of Israel and patron of its royal dynasty.[7] Over time, Yahwism became increasingly intolerant of rivals, and the royal court and temple promoted Yahweh as the god of the entire cosmos, possessing all the positive qualities previously attributed to the other gods and goddesses.[8][9] With the work of Second Isaiah (the theoretical author of the second part of the Book of Isaiah) towards the end of the Babylonian exile (6th century BC), the very existence of foreign gods was denied, and Yahweh was proclaimed as the creator of the cosmos and the true god of all the world.[9]


Contents  [hide]
1 Origins
2 Yahweh and the gods of Canaan
3 Yahwism in Israel (Samaria) and Judah, c.930–580 BCE 3.1 Yahweh as national god (God of Israel)
3.2 Worship (temples, sacrifice, etc)
3.3 Relationship to other gods and goddesses
3.4 Monotheism
4 See also
5 Notes
6 References 6.1 Citations
6.2 Bibliography


Origins[edit]
See also: Tetragrammaton, Jehovah and Names of God in Judaism


The Tetragrammaton in Phoenician alphabet (10th century BC to 135 AD), Paleo-Hebrew (10th century BC to 4th century AD) and square Hebrew (3rd century BC to present) scripts. NOTE: Hebrew is written from right to left.
Yahweh appears to have been unique to the two kingdoms of Israel and Judah.[10] He may have originated as a title for El, the head of the Canaanite pantheon (el dū yahwī ṣaba’ôt, "El who creates the hosts", meaning the heavenly army accompanying El as he marched beside the earthly armies of Israel), but although El and Yahweh have much in common they also have many differences.[11] The more probable explanation is that Yahweh originated as a storm-god from regions south of Israel and Judah.[12] Further support for the southern hypothesis comes from Egyptian inscriptions that mention a "land of the Shasu Yahu", the Shasu being nomads from the region of Midian and Edom and Yahu (or more accurately, YHW) a place name; there is considerable acceptance among scholars that YHW refers to the name Yahweh.[13]
If Yahweh originated in the deserts south of Israel, the question that arises is how he made his way to the north.[14] A widely accepted hypothesis (called the Kenite hypothesis, after one of the groups involved) is that traders brought Yahweh to Israel along the caravan routes between Egypt and Canaan.[15] The strength of this hypothesis is the way it ties together various points of data, such as the absence of Yahweh from Canaan, his links with Edom and Midian in the biblical stories, and the Kenite or Midianite ties of Moses.[16]
Yahweh and the gods of Canaan[edit]
Scholars agree that the Israelite community arose peacefully and internally in the highlands of Canaan[17]–in the words of archaeologist William Dever, "most of those who came to call themselves Israelites … were or had been indigenous Canaanites"–[18][Notes 1] and that Israelite religion accordingly emerged gradually from a Canaanite milieu.[19]
El, not Yahweh, was the original "God of Israel"–the word "Israel" is based on the name El rather than Yahweh.[20] He was the chief of the Canaanite gods, described as "the kind, the compassionate," "the creator of creatures".[21] He lived in a tent on a mountain from whose base originated all the fresh waters of the world, from where he presided over the Assembly of the Gods with the goddess Asherah as his consort.[21][22] The pair made up the top tier of the Canaanite pantheon;[21] the second tier was made up of their children, the "seventy sons of Athirat" (another name of Asherah).[23] Prominent in this group was Baal, with his home on Mount Zaphon; he gradually became the dominant deity, so that El became the executive power and Baal the military power in the cosmos.[24] Baal's sphere was the thunderstorm with its life-giving rains, so that he was also a fertility god, although not quite the fertility god.[25] The third tier was made up of comparatively minor craftsman and trader deities, and the fourth and final tier of divine messengers and the like.[23] Yahweh, the southern warrior-god, joined the pantheon headed by El and in time he and El were identified, with El's name becoming a generic term for "god".[22] Each member of the divine council had a human nation under his care, and a textual variant of Deuteronomy 32:8–9 describes the sons of El, including Yahweh, each receiving his own people:[20]
When the Most High (Elyon, i.e., El) gave the nations their inheritanceWhen he separated humanityHe fixed the boundaries of the peoplesaccording to the number of divine beings;For Yahweh's portion is his peopleJacob his allotted heritage.[Notes 2]
Yahwism in Israel (Samaria) and Judah, c.930–580 BCE[edit]
Yahweh as national god (God of Israel)[edit]
Israel emerges into the historical record in the last decades of the 13th century BCE, at the very end of the Late Bronze Age, as the Cannanite city-state system was ending.[26] By the 9th century BCE a new system of nation-states was forming (Israel, Judah, Moab, Ammon and others), marked by, among other things, the emergence of national gods.[27] What distinguished Israel from other emerging Iron Age Canaanite societies was its elevation of Yahweh as the national god, rather than, for example, Chemosh, the god of Moab, or Moloch, the god of the Ammonites.[28]
According to the Hebrew Bible Israel began in the 10th century as a united kingdom ruled by David and his son Solomon before splitting into the two separate states of Judah and Israel.[29] Since the 1980s scholars have reassessed this picture and now believe that a significant northern kingdom emerged only in the 9th century BCE, while Judah emerged as a state only in the 8th.[30][31]
Israel was as one of a number of regional kingdoms which crystallised along the trade route between Egypt and Mesopotamia at the close of the Bronze Age, all of which seem to have adopted a national god.[32] The gods came to represent their nations, and stood more or less equal to each other–Chemosh, for example, represented Moab just as Yahweh represented Israel.[33] The idea that the worship of Yahweh as national god played a key role in the formation of the monarchic state remains common among scholars, but the evidence is in fact slender—for example, none of the patriarchs, tribes, or early kings has a name based on Yahweh.[34] We do not know what god the earliest kings worshiped, but from the mid-9th century the court cult in Israel (meaning the northern kingdom) was definitely linked to Yahweh, and same applied to Judah from the time of king Jehoshaphat, a close ally of the king of Israel.[35]
It was in Samaria that Yahweh had the title "God of Israel"–no "God of Judah" is mentioned anywhere in the Bible–[36] and the name "Israel" appears to have taken on an ideological role in Judah after the fall of Samaria to the Assyrians in c.720 BCE, with Judah cast as the "true" Israel.[37]
The emergence of the monarchic state involved the concentration of power through kingship.[38] The king used national religion to exert his authority,[9] and as head of the state was also the head of the national religion and God's viceroy on Earth.[39]
Worship (temples, sacrifice, etc)[edit]
The Hebrew Bible gives the impression that the temple in Jerusalem was the most important or even sole temple of Yahweh, but this was not the case.[40] The earliest known Israelite place of worship is a 12th-century open-air altar in the hills of Samaria featuring a bronze bull reminiscent of Canaanite "Bull-El" (El in the form of a bull), and the archaeological remains of further temples have been found at Dan on Israel's northern border, at Arad in the Negev, and at Beersheba (both in the territory of Judah);[41] the evidence of the Biblical texts indicates further that Shiloh, Bethel, Gilgal, Mizpah, Ramah and Dan were major sites for festivals, sacrifices, making of vows, private rituals and the adjudication of legal disputes.[42]
Several peoples in ancient Syria and Palestine, including the Israelites, had cults focused on standing stones rather than on an image of their god, and it is probable that the earliest Yahweh-worshipers followed this tradition.[43] Later practice was mixed: the temple at Arad had standing stones, but the temple in Jerusalem famously had a throne in the form of two cherubim, their inner wings forming the seat and a box (the Ark of the Covenant) as a footstool.[44] According to Deuteronomy 10:1-5 and 1 Kings 8:9,21 this contained the Tablets of the Law, but in fact the two stones may have been standing-stones representing Yahweh and Asherah.[44] The northern kingdom, following the Canaanite El tradition, may have worshiped Yahweh in the form of a bull.
Each year the king presided over a ceremony in which Yahweh was enthroned in the Temple,[45] and the centre of his worship lay in three great annual festivals coinciding with major events in rural life: Passover with the birthing of lambs, Shavuot with the cereal harvest, and Sukkot with the fruit harvest.[46] These probably pre-dated the arrival of the Yahweh religion,[46] but became linked to events in the invented national history of Israel: Passover with the exodus from Egypt, Shavuot with the law-giving at Sinai, and Sukkot with the wilderness wanderings.[40] The festivals thus celebrated Yahweh's salvation of Israel and Israel's status as his holy people, although the earlier agricultural meaning was not entirely lost.[47]
Yahweh's worship presumably involved sacrifice, but many scholars have concluded that the rituals detailed in Leviticus 1-16, with their stress on purity and atonement, were introduced only after the Babylonian exile, and that in reality any head of a family was able to offer sacrifice as occasion demanded.[48] (A number of scholars have also drawn the conclusion that infant sacrifice, whether to the underworld deity Molech or to Yahweh himself, was a part of Israelite/Judahite religion until the reforms of King Josiah in the late 7th century BCE).[49] Sacrifice was presumably complemented by the singing or recital of psalms on occasions varying from royal and public to communal and personal, but again the details are scant.[50] Prayer played little role in official worship.[51]
Everything in the moral realm was understood in relation to Yahweh as a manifestation of holiness. Divine law protected family relationships and the welfare of the weaker members of society; purity of conduct, dress, food, etc. were regulated. Religious leadership resided in priests who were associated with sanctuaries, and also in prophets, who were bearers of divine oracles. In the political sphere the king was understood as the appointee and agent of Yahweh.[52]
Relationship to other gods and goddesses[edit]
The Hebrew Bible provides evidence that many gods other than Yahweh were worshiped in Israel and Judah–for example, when King Josiah reformed Jerusalem's religious practice in the late 7th century, places of worship for other gods around Jerusalem had to be destroyed, priests had to be stopped from burning incense to Baal and the sun and moon and the "host of heaven," and Yahweh's own temple had to be purged of Baal, Asherah, the Host of Heaven, the chariots of the sun, and more.[53]
Yahweh and El merged at religious centres such as Shechem, Shiloh and Jerusalem, and the priesthood of Yahweh inherited the religious lore of El.[54] Yahweh appropriated many of the older supreme god's titles such as El Shaddai (El of the Mountains) and El Elyon (El Almighty), but Yahwism did not absorb the bull cult associated with El, and the rejection of the golden calf of Aaron and the bulls of Jeroboam was fundamental to the Israelite self-understanding as expressed in the biblical scriptures.
Yahweh's appearances as a storm god owe much to Canaanite depictions of Baal.[55] Baal and Yahweh coexisted in the early period of Israel's history, but from the 9th century they were considered irreconcilable, probably as a result of the attempts of King Ahab and Jezebel, his Phoenician queen, to elevate him in the northern kingdom.[56]
Goddesses worshiped in Israel and Judah included Asherah, Astarte, and a deity called the Queen of Heaven, who was probably a fusion of Astarte and the Mesopotamian goddess Ishtar.[57] Evidence increasingly suggests Asherah, formerly the wife of El, was worshiped as Yahweh's consort, and various biblical passages indicate that her statues were kept in his temples in Jerusalem, Bethel, and Samaria.[57] Yahweh may also have appropriated Anat, the wife of Baal, as his consort, as Anat-Yahu ("Anat of Yahu," i.e., Yahweh) is mentioned in 5th century records from the Jewish colony at Elephantine in Egypt.[58]
There is evidence also of the worship of further gods and goddesses from the Canaanite pantheon, such as the "Queen of Heaven" mentioned in Jeremiah who might be Astarte (also known as Ishtar,[59] Both the archaeological evidence and the biblical texts document tensions between groups comfortable with the worship of Yahweh alongside local deities such as Asherah and Baal and those insistent on worship of Yahweh alone during the monarchical period (1 Kings 18, Jeremiah 2)[60][61] The Deuteronomistic source gives evidence of a strong monotheistic party during the reign of king Josiah during the late 7th century BCE, but the strength and prevalence of earlier monotheistic worship of Yahweh is widely debated based on interpretations of how much of the Deuteronomistic history is accurately based on earlier sources, and how much Deuteronomistic redactors have re-worked that history to bolster their own theological views.[62] The archaeological record documents widespread polytheism in and around Israel during the period of the monarchy.[60]
Traditional scholarship distinguished "orthodox Yahwism"–the worship of Yahweh alone by the elite–from heterodox popular and family religion,[63][64] but there was in fact no authority deciding what was orthodox and what was not, and Yahweh was probably only one among many objects of veneration.[65] Orthodox or "normative" Yahwism did not exist in either Israel or Judah for most of the monarchical period.[66]
Monotheism[edit]
Scholars agree that Israelite monotheism was the culmination of a unique set of historical circumstances.[67] Pre-exilic Israel, like its neighbours, was polytheistic; the worship of Yahweh alone began at the earliest with Elijah in the 9th century BCE, but more likely with the prophet Hosea in the 8th; even then it remained the concern of a small party (with the brief exception of a period of royal support under Josiah), before gaining ascendancy in the exilic and early post-exilic period.[68] The process by which this came about might be described as follows: In the early tribal period each tribe would have had its own patron god; the Israelite state, when kingship emerged, promoted Yahweh as the "God of Israel," supreme over the other gods, and gradually Yahweh absorbed all the positive traits of the other gods and goddesses; finally, in the national crisis of the exile, the very existence of other gods was denied.[9]
The fifth century Elephantine papyri were written by a group of Egyptian Jews living at Elephantine near the Nubian border, and witness a religion that has been described as "nearly identical to Iron Age II Judahite religion".[69] The papyri describe these Jews as worshiping Anat-Yahu (or AnatYahu), either the wife of Yahweh or as a hypostatized aspect of the god.[58][70][71] "Even in exile and beyond, the veneration of a female deity endured."[72]
See also[edit]
Adonai
Ancient Semitic religion
Canaanite religion
God
God in Abrahamic religions
Jehovah
Kyrios
Sacred Name Movement
the seven names of God
Notes[edit]
1.Jump up ^ Canaanites in this article means the indigenous Bronze Age and early Iron Age inhabitants of southern Syria, the coast of Lebanon, Israel, the West Bank and Jordan. – Dever, 2002, p.219
2.Jump up ^ For the varying texts of this verse, see Smith, 2012, pp.139-140 and also chapter 4.
References[edit]
Citations[edit]
1.Jump up ^ Edelman 1995, p. 190.
2.Jump up ^ Miller 1986, p. 110.
3.Jump up ^ Grabbe 2007, p. 153.
4.Jump up ^ Dijkstra 2001, p. 92.
5.Jump up ^ Dever 2003, p. 128.
6.Jump up ^ Hackett 2001, p. 158–159.
7.Jump up ^ Smith 2002, p. 72.
8.Jump up ^ Wyatt 2010, p. 69–70.
9.^ Jump up to: a b c d Betz 2000, p. 917.
10.Jump up ^ Grabbe 2010, p. 184.
11.Jump up ^ Chalmers 2012, p. no pagination.
12.Jump up ^ Smith 2000, p. 384-385.
13.Jump up ^ Grabbe 2007, p. 151,153.
14.Jump up ^ Van Der Toorn 1999, p. 912.
15.Jump up ^ Van Der Toorn 1999, p. 912-913.
16.Jump up ^ Van Der Toorn 2010, p. 247-248.
17.Jump up ^ Gnuse 1997, p. 31.
18.Jump up ^ Dever 2003, p. 228.
19.Jump up ^ Cook 2004, p. 7.
20.^ Jump up to: a b Smith 2002, p. 32.
21.^ Jump up to: a b c Coogan & Smith 2012, p. 8.
22.^ Jump up to: a b Smith 2002, p. 33.
23.^ Jump up to: a b Hess 2007, p. 103.
24.Jump up ^ Coogan & Smith 2012, p. 7–8.
25.Jump up ^ Handy 1994, p. 101.
26.Jump up ^ Noll 2001, p. 124–126.
27.Jump up ^ Schniedewind 2013, p. 93.
28.Jump up ^ Hackett 2001, p. 156.
29.Jump up ^ Moore & Kelle 2011, p. 266.
30.Jump up ^ Niehr 1995, p. 53.
31.Jump up ^ Moore & Kelle 2011, p. 268.
32.Jump up ^ Halpern & Adams 2009, p. 26.
33.Jump up ^ Smith 2010, p. 119–120.
34.Jump up ^ Moore & Kelle 2011, p. 126–127.
35.Jump up ^ Levin 2013, p. 247.
36.Jump up ^ Davies 2010, p. 107.
37.Jump up ^ Wyatt 2010, p. 61, footnote 1.
38.Jump up ^ Meyers 2001, p. 166–168.
39.Jump up ^ Miller 2000, p. 90.
40.^ Jump up to: a b Davies 2012, p. 112.
41.Jump up ^ Dever 2003a, p. 388.
42.Jump up ^ Bennett 2002, p. 83.
43.Jump up ^ Mettinger 2006, p. 288-289.
44.^ Jump up to: a b Mettinger 2006, p. 290.
45.Jump up ^ Petersen 1998, p. 23.
46.^ Jump up to: a b Albertz 1994, p. 89.
47.Jump up ^ Gorman 2000, p. 458.
48.Jump up ^ Davies & Rogerson 2005, p. 151-152.
49.Jump up ^ Gnuse 1997, p. 118.
50.Jump up ^ Davies & Rogerson 2005, p. 158-165.
51.Jump up ^ Cohen 1999, p. 302.
52.Jump up ^ Miller 2000, p. 50–51.
53.Jump up ^ Collins 2005, p. 101–102.
54.Jump up ^ Smith 2001, p. 140.
55.Jump up ^ Collins 2005, p. 101-102.
56.Jump up ^ Smith 2002, p. 47.
57.^ Jump up to: a b Ackerman 2003, p. 395.
58.^ Jump up to: a b Day 2002, p. 143.
59.Jump up ^ Dever 2005, p. 234.
60.^ Jump up to: a b & Keel 1998, p. not defined.
61.Jump up ^ Smith 2001, p. not defined.
62.Jump up ^ Smith 2001, p. 151–154.
63.Jump up ^ Collins 2005, p. 122-123.
64.Jump up ^ Darby 2014, p. 50.
65.Jump up ^ Bennett 2002, p. 84.
66.Jump up ^ Ahlstrom 1991, p. 140.
67.Jump up ^ Gnuse 2006, p. 129.
68.Jump up ^ Albertz 1994, p. 61.
69.Jump up ^ Noll 2001, p. 248.
70.Jump up ^ Niehr 1995, p. 58.
71.Jump up ^ Ackerman 2003, p. 394.
72.Jump up ^ Gnuse 1997, p. 185.
Bibliography[edit]
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Ahlstrom, Gosta W. (1991). "The Role of Archaeological and Literary Remains in Reconstructing Israel's History". In Edelman, Diana Vikander. The Fabric of History: Text, Artifact and Israel's Past. A&C Black.
Albertz, Rainer (1994). A History of Israelite Religion, Volume I: From the Beginnings to the End of the Monarchy. Westminster John Knox.
Becking, Bob (2001). "The Gods in Whom They Trusted". In Becking, Bob. Only One God?: Monotheism in Ancient Israel and the Veneration of the Goddess Asherah. A&C Black.
Bennett, Harold V. (2002). Injustice Made Legal: Deuteronomic Law and the Plight of Widows, Strangers, and Orphans in Ancient Israel. Eerdmans.
Betz, Arnold Gottfried (2000). "Monotheism". In Freedman, David Noel; Myer, Allen C. Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible. Eerdmans. ISBN 9053565035.
Chalmers, Aaron (2012). Exploring the Religion of Ancient Israel: Prophet, Priest, Sage and People. SPCK.
Cohen, Shaye J.D. (1999). "The Temple and the Synagogue". In Finkelstein, Louis; Davies, W. D.; Horbury, William. The Cambridge History of Judaism: Volume 3, The Early Roman Period. Cambridge University Press.
Cohn, Norman (2001). Cosmos, Chaos, and the World to Come: The Ancient Roots of Apocalyptic Faith. Yale University Press.
Collins, John J. (2005). The Bible After Babel: Historical Criticism in a Postmodern Age. Eerdmans.
Coogan, Michael D.; Smith, Mark S. (2012). Stories from Ancient Canaan (2nd Edition). Presbyterian Publishing Corp. ISBN 9053565035.
Cook, Stephen L. (2004). The Social Roots of Biblical Yahwism. Society of Biblical Literature.
Darby, Erin (2014). Interpreting Judean Pillar Figurines: Gender and Empire in Judean Apotropaic Ritual. Mohr Siebeck.
Davies, Philip R.; Rogerson, John (2005). The Old Testament World. Westminster John Knox.
Davies, Philip R. (2010). "Urban Religion and Rural Religion". In Stavrakopoulou, Francesca; Barton, John. Religious Diversity in Ancient Israel and Judah. Continuum International Publishing Group.
Day, John (2002). Yahweh and the Gods and Goddesses of Canaan. Continuum.
Dever, William G. (2003a). "Religion and Cult in the Levant". In Richard, Suzanne. Near Eastern Archaeology:A Reader. Eisenbrauns. ISBN 978-1-57506-083-5.
Dever, William G. (2003b). Who Were the Early Israelites and Where Did They Come From. Eerdmans.
Dever, William G. (2005). Did God Have A Wife?: Archaeology And Folk Religion In Ancient Israel. Eerdmans. ISBN 978-0-8028-2852-1.
Dijkstra, Meindert (2001). "El the God of Israel-Israel the People of YHWH: On the Origins of Ancient Israelite Yahwism". In Becking, Bob; Dijkstra, Meindert; Korpel, Marjo C.A. et al. Only One God?: Monotheism in Ancient Israel and the Veneration of the Goddess Asherah. A&C Black.
Edelman, Diana V. (1995). "Tracking Observance of the Aniconic Tradition". In Edelman, Diana Vikander. The Triumph of Elohim: From Yahwisms to Judaisms. Peeters Publishers. ISBN 9053565035.
Elior, Rachel (2006). "Early Forms of Jewish Mysticism". In Katz, Steven T. The Cambridge History of Judaism: The Late Roman-Rabbinic Period. Cambridge University Press.
Gnuse, Robert Karl (1997). No Other Gods: Emergent Monotheism in Israel. Continuum.
Gorman, Frank H., Jr. (2000). "Feasts, Festivals". In Freedman, David Noel; Myers, Allen C. Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible. Amsterdam University Press. ISBN 978-1-57506-083-5.
Finkelstein, Israel; Silberman, Neil Asher (2002). The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology's New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Sacred Texts. Simon and Schuster.
Frerichs, Ernest S. (1998). The Bible and Bibles in America. Scholars Press.
Gnuse, Robert (1999). "The Emergence of Monotheism in Ancient Israel: A Survey of Recent Scholarship". Religion 29: 315–336.
Grabbe, Lester (2010). "'Many nations will be joined to YHWH in that day': The question of YHWH outside Judah". In Stavrakopoulou, Francesca; Barton, John. Religious diversity in Ancient Israel and Judah. Continuum International Publishing Group. ISBN 978-0-567-03216-4.
Grabbe, Lester (2007). Ancient Israel: What Do We Know and How Do We Know It?. A&C Black.
Hackett, Jo Ann (2001). "'There Was No King In Israel': The Era of the Judges". In Coogan, Michael David. The Oxford History of the Biblical World. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-513937-2.
Halpern, Baruch; Adams, Matthew J. (2009). From Gods to God: The Dynamics of Iron Age Cosmologies. Mohr Siebeck.
Handy, Lowell K. (1995). Among the Host of Heaven: The Syro-Palestinian Pantheon as Bureaucracy. Eisenbrauns.
Hess, Richard S. (2007). Israelite Religions: An Archaeological and Biblical Survey. Baker Academic.
Humphries, W. Lee (1990). "God, Names of". In Bullard, Roger Aubrey. Mercer Dictionary of the Bible. Mercer University Press.
Keel, Othmar (1997). The Symbolism of the Biblical World: Ancient Near Eastern Iconography and the Book of Psalms. Eisenbrauns.
Levin, Christoph (2013). Re-Reading the Scriptures: Essays on the Literary History of the Old Testament. Mohr Siebeck.
Liverani, Mario (2014). Israel's History and the History of Israel. Routledge. ISBN 978-1317488934.
Mafico, Temba L.J. (1992). "The Divine Name Yahweh Alohim from an African Perspective". In Segovia, Fernando F.; Tolbert, Mary Ann. Reading from this Place: Social Location and Biblical Interpretation in Global Perspective 2. Fortress Press.
Mastin, B.A. (2005). "Yahweh's Asherah, Inclusive Monotheism and the Question of Dating". In Day, John. In Search of Pre-Exilic Israel. Bloomsbury.
Mettinger, Tryggve N.D. (2006). "A Conversation With My Critics: Cultic Image or Aniconism in the First Temple?". In Amit, Yaira; Naʼaman, Nadav. Essays on Ancient Israel in Its Near Eastern Context. Eisenbrauns.
Meyers, Carol (2001). "Kinship and Kingship: The early Monarchy". In Coogan, Michael David. The Oxford History of the Biblical World. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-513937-2.
McDonald, Nathan (2007). "Aniconism in the Old Testament". In Gordon, R.P. The God of Israel. Cambridge University Press.
Miller, Patrick D (2000). The Religion of Ancient Israel. Westminster John Knox Press. ISBN 978-0-664-22145-4.
Miller, Patrick D (1986). A History of Ancient Israel and Judah. Westminster John Knox Press.
Moore, Megan Bishop; Kelle, Brad E. (2011). Biblical History and Israel's Past: The Changing Study of the Bible and History. Eerdmans.
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Smith, Mark S. (2001). The Origins of Biblical Monotheism: Israel's Polytheistic Background and the Ugaritic Texts. Oxford University Press.
Smith, Mark S. (2002). The Early History of God: Yahweh and the Other Deities in Ancient Israel. Eerdmans.
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Van Der Toorn, Karel (1996). Family Religion in Babylonia, Ugarit and Israel: Continuity and Changes in the Forms of Religious Life. BRILL.
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Wyatt, Nicolas (2010). "Royal Religion in Ancient Judah". In Stavrakopoulou, Francesca; Barton, John. Religious Diversity in Ancient Israel and Judah. Continuum International Publishing Group. ISBN 978-0-567-03216-4.


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Canaanite religion

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 The land of Canaan, which comprises the modern regions of Israel, the West Bank, Gaza Strip, Lebanon, Jordan and Syria. At the time when Canaanite religion was practiced, Canaan was divided into various city-states.
Canaanite religion is the name for the group of Ancient Semitic religions practiced by the Canaanites living in the ancient Levant from at least the early Bronze Age through the first centuries of the Common Era.
Canaanite religion was polytheistic, and in some cases monolatristic.


Contents  [hide]
1 Beliefs 1.1 Afterlife; Cult of the Dead
1.2 Cosmology
1.3 Mythology
2 History 2.1 The Canaanites
2.2 Influences
3 Contact with other areas
4 Hebrew Bible
5 Sources 5.1 Literary sources
5.2 Archaeological sources
6 See also
7 References

Beliefs[edit]



 Ba'al with raised arm, 14th-12th century BC, found at Ras Shamra (ancient Ugarit), Louvre
A great number of deities were worshipped by the followers of the Canaanite religion; this is a partial listing:
Anat, virgin goddess of war and strife, sister and putative mate of Ba'al Hadad
Athirat, "walker of the sea", Mother Goddess, wife of El (also known as Elat and after the Bronze Age as Asherah)
Athtart, better known by her Greek name Astarte, assists Anat in The Myth of Ba'al
Attar, god of the morning star ("son of the morning") who tried to take the place of the dead Baal and failed. Male counterpart of Athtart.
Baalat or Baalit, the wife or female counterpart of Baal (also Belili)
Ba'al Hadad (lit. master of thunder), storm god.
Baal Hammon, god of fertility and renewer of all energies in the Phoenician colonies of the Western Mediterranean
Dagon, god of crop fertility and grain, father of Ba'al Hadad
El Elyon (lit. God Most High) and El; also transliterated as Ilu
Eshmun, god, or as Baalat Asclepius, goddess, of healing
Ishat, goddess of fire. She was slain by Anat.[1][2][3]
Kotharat, goddesses of marriage and pregnancy
Kothar-wa-Khasis, the skilled, god of craftsmanship
Lotan, the twisting, seven-headed serpent ally of Yam
Marqod, God of Dance
Melqart, king of the city, the underworld and cycle of vegetation in Tyre
Molech or Moloch, putative god of fire[4]
Mot or Mawat, god of death (not worshiped or given offerings)
Nikkal-wa-Ib, goddess of orchards and fruit
Qadeshtu, lit. "Holy One", putative goddess of love.
Resheph, god of plague and of healing
Shachar and Shalim, twin gods of dawn and dusk, respectively. Shalim was linked to the netherworld via the evening star and associated with peace[5]
Shamayim, (lit. skies) the god of the heavens
Shapash, also transliterated Shapshu, goddess of the sun; sometimes equated with the Mesopotamian sun god Shemesh[6] whose gender is disputed[7]
Yam (lit. sea-river) the god of the sea and the river,[8] also called Judge Nahar (judge of the river).[9][10][11]
Sydyk, the god of righteousness or justice, sometimes twinned with Misor, and linked to the planet Jupiter[12][13]
Yahweh may exist as an ending of some Amorite male names,[14] though the only Canaanite mention of Yahweh, found on the Mesha Stele, refers to the god of Israel contrasted with Chemosh.[15]
Yarikh, god of the moon and husband of Nikkal
Afterlife; Cult of the Dead[edit]
According to Canaanite beliefs, when the physical body dies, the npš (usually translated as "soul") departs from the body to the land of Mot. Bodies were buried with grave goods, and offerings of food and drink were made to the dead to ensure that they would not bother the living. Dead relatives were venerated and sometimes asked for help.[16][17]
Cosmology[edit]
So far, none of the inscribed tablets found in 1929 in the Canaanite city of Ugarit (destroyed ca. 1200 BC) has revealed a cosmology. Any idea of one is often reconstructed from the much later Phoenician text by Philo of Byblos (c. 64–141 AD), after much Greek and Roman influence in the region.
According to the pantheon, known in Ugarit as 'ilhm (=Elohim) or the children of El, supposedly obtained by Philo of Byblos from Sanchuniathon of Berythus (Beirut) the creator was known as Elion, who was the father of the divinities, and in the Greek sources he was married to Beruth (Beirut = the city). This marriage of the divinity with the city would seem to have Biblical parallels too with the stories of the link between Melkart and Tyre; Chemosh and Moab; Tanit and Baal Hammon in Carthage.
From the union of El Elyon and his consort were born Uranus and Ge, Greek names for the "Heaven" and the "Earth".
In Canaanite mythology there were twin mountains Targhizizi and Tharumagi which hold the firmament up above the earth-circling ocean, thereby bounding the earth. W. F. Albright, for example, says that El Shaddai is a derivation of a Semitic stem that appears in the Akkadian shadû ("mountain") and shaddā`û or shaddû`a ("mountain-dweller"), one of the names of Amurru. Philo of Byblos states that Atlas was one of the Elohim, which would clearly fit into the story of El Shaddai as "God of the Mountain(s)." Harriet Lutzky has presented evidence that Shaddai was an attribute of a Semitic goddess, linking the epithet with Hebrew šad "breast" as "the one of the Breast". The idea of two mountains being associated here as the breasts of the Earth, fits into the Canaanite mythology quite well. The ideas of pairs of mountains seem to be quite common in Canaanite mythology (similar to Horeb and Sinai in the Bible). The late period of this cosmology makes it difficult to tell what influences (Roman, Greek, or Hebrew) may have informed Philo's writings.
Mythology[edit]
In the Baal cycle, Ba'al Hadad is challenged by and defeats Yam, using two magical weapons (called "Driver" and "Chaser") made for him by Kothar-wa-Khasis. Afterward, with the help of Athirat and Anat, Ba'al persuades El to allow him a palace. El approves, and the palace is built by Kothar-wa-Khasis. After the palace is constructed, Ba'al gives forth a thunderous roar out of the palace window and challenges Mot. Mot enters through the window and swallows Ba'al, sending him to the Underworld. With no one to give rain, there is a terrible drought in Ba'al's absence. The other deities, especially El and Anat, are distraught that Ba'al has been taken to the Underworld. Anat goes to the Underworld, attacks Mot with a knife, grinds him up into pieces, and scatters him far and wide. With Mot defeated, Ba'al is able to return and refresh the Earth with rain.[18]
History[edit]
The Canaanites[edit]
Main article: Canaanites
The Levant region was inhabited by people who themselves referred to the land as 'ca-na-na-um' as early as the mid-third millennium BCE.[19] There are a number of possible etymologies for the word.
Some[who?] suggest the name comes from the Semitic word "cana'ani", meaning merchant, for which the Phoenicians became justly famous.
The Akkadian word "kinahhu", however, referred to the purple-colored wool, dyed from the Murex molluscs of the coast, which was throughout history a key export of the region. When the Greeks later traded with the Canaanites, this meaning of the word seems to have predominated as they called the Canaanites the Phoenikes or "Phoenicians", which may derive from the Greek word "Phoenix" meaning crimson or purple, and again described the cloth for which the Greeks also traded. The Romans transcribed "phoenix" to "poenus", thus calling the descendants of the Canaanite settlers in Carthage "Punic".
Thus while "Phoenician" and "Canaanite" refer to the same culture, archaeologists and historians commonly refer to the Bronze Age, pre-1200 BC Levantines as Canaanites and their Iron Age descendants, particularly those living on the coast, as Phoenicians. More recently, the term Canaanite has been used for the secondary Iron Age states of the interior, that were not ruled by Aramaean peoples, a separate and closely related ethnic group which included the Philistines and the states of Israel and Judah.[20]
Influences[edit]
Canaanite religion was strongly influenced by their more powerful and populous neighbors, and shows clear influence of Mesopotamian and Egyptian religious practices. Like other people of the Ancient Near East Canaanite religious beliefs were polytheistic, with families typically focusing worship on ancestral household gods and goddesses, the Elohim, while acknowledging the existence of other deities such as Baal and El, Asherah and Astarte. Kings also played an important religious role and in certain ceremonies, such as the sacred marriage of the New Year Festival, may have been revered as gods. "At the center of Canaanite religion was royal concern for religious and political legitimacy and the imposition of a divinely ordained legal structure, as well as peasant emphasis on fertility of the crops, flocks, and humans."[21] [22]
Contact with other areas[edit]


 This section possibly contains original research. Please improve it by verifying the claims made and adding inline citations. Statements consisting only of original research should be removed. (January 2015)
Canaanite religion was influenced by its peripheral position, intermediary between Egypt and Mesopotamia, whose religions had a growing impact upon Canaanite religion. For example during the Hyksos period, when chariot-mounted maryannu ruled in Egypt, at their capital city of Avaris, Baal became associated with the Egyptian god Set, and was considered identical – particularly with Set in his form as Sutekh. Iconographically henceforth Baal was shown wearing the crown of Lower Egypt and shown in the Egyptian-like stance, one foot set before the other. Similarly Athirat (known by her later Hebrew name Asherah), Athtart (known by her later Greek name Astarte), and Anath henceforth were portrayed wearing Hathor-like Egyptian wigs.
From the other direction, Jean Bottero has suggested that Yah of Ebla (a possible precursor of Yam) was equated with the Mesopotamian god Ea during the Akkadian period. In the Middle and Late Bronze Age, there are also strong Hurrian and Mitannite influences upon the Canaanite religion. The Hurrian goddess Hebat was worshiped in Jerusalem, and Baal was closely considered equivalent to the Hurrian storm god Teshub and the Hittite storm god Tarhunt. Canaanite divinities seem to have been almost identical in form and function to the neighboring Aramaeans to the east, and Baal Hadad and El can be distinguished amongst earlier Amorites, who at the end of the Early Bronze Age invaded Mesopotamia.
Carried west by Phoenician sailors, Canaanite religious influences can be seen in Greek mythology, particularly in the tripartite division between the Olympians Zeus, Poseidon and Hades, mirroring the division between Baal, Yam and Mot, and in the story of the Labours of Hercules, mirroring the stories of the Tyrian Melkart, who was often equated with Heracles.
Hebrew Bible[edit]
See also: Category:Deities in the Hebrew Bible
El Elyon also appears in Baalam's story in Numbers and in Moses song in Deuteronomy 32:8. The Masoretic Texts suggest:
When the Most High (`Elyōn) divided to the nations their inheritance, he separated the sons of man (Ādām); he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the sons of Israel"
Sources[edit]
The sources for Canaanite religion are literary sources, mainly from Late Bronze Age Ugarit[23] and supplemented by biblical sources, and from archaeological discoveries.
Literary sources[edit]



 The ruins of the excavated city of Ras Shamra, or Ugarit.
Until the excavation of Ras Shamra in Northern Syria (the site historically known as Ugarit), and the discovery of its Bronze Age archive of clay tablet alphabetic cuneiform excavated by Claude F. A. Schaefer,[24] little was known of Canaanite religion, as papyrus seems to have been the preferred writing medium. Unlike in Egypt, where papyrus may survive centuries in the extremely dry climate, these have simply decayed in the humid Mediterranean climate.[25] As a result, the accounts contained within the Bible were almost the only sources of information on ancient Canaanite religion. This was supplemented by a few secondary and tertiary Greek sources (Lucian of Samosata's De Dea Syria (The Syrian Goddess), fragments of the Phoenician History of Philo of Byblos, and the writings of Damascius). More recently detailed study of the Ugaritic material, other inscriptions from the Levant and also of the Ebla archive from Tel Mardikh, excavated in 1960 by a joint Italo-Syrian team, have cast more light on the early Canaanite religion.[25][26]
According to The Encyclopedia of Religion, the Ugarit texts were one part of a larger religion, that was based on the religious teachings of Babylon. The Canaanite scribes that produced the Baal texts were also trained to write in Babylonian cuniform, including Sumerian and Akkadian texts of every genre.[27]
Archaeological sources[edit]
Archaeological excavations in the last few decades have unearthed more about the religion of the ancient Canaanites.[20] The excavation of the city of Ras Shamra and the discovery of its Bronze Age archive of clay tablet alphabetic cuneiform texts, helped provide a wealth of new information. More recently, detailed study of the Ugaritic material, other inscriptions from the Levant and also of the Ebla archive from Tel Mardikh, excavated in 1960 by a joint Italo-Syrian team, have cast more light on the early Canaanite religion.
See also[edit]
Ancient Semitic religion
Canaanism
List of Canaanite deities
Semitic neopaganism
References[edit]
Notes
1.Jump up ^ Gorelick, Leonard; Williams-Forte, Elizabeth; Ancient seals and the Bible. International Institute for Mesopotamian Area Studies. p.32
2.Jump up ^ Dietrich, Manfried; Loretz, Oswald; Ugarit-Forschungen: Internationales Jahrbuch für die Altertumskunde Syrien-Palästinas, Volume 31. p.362
3.Jump up ^ Kang, Sa-Moon, Divine war in the Old Testament and in the ancient Near East. p.79
4.Jump up ^ "alleged but not securely attested", according to Johnston, Sarah Isles, Religions of the Ancient World: A Guide. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. ISBN 0-674-01517-7. p.335
5.Jump up ^ Botterweck, G.J.; Ringgren, H.; Fabry, H.J. (2006). Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament 15 (v. 15). Alban Books Limited. p. 24. ISBN 9780802823397. Retrieved 2014-12-15.
6.Jump up ^ Johnston, Sarah Isles, Religions of the Ancient World: A Guide. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. ISBN 0-674-01517-7. P. 418
7.Jump up ^ Some authorities consider Shemesh to be a goddess, see Wyatt, Nick, There's Such Divinity Doth Hedge a King, Ashgate (19 Jul 2005), ISBN 978-0-7546-5330-1, p. 104
8.Jump up ^ Ugaritic text: KTU 1.1 IV 14
9.Jump up ^ "The Shelby White & Leon Levy Program: Dig Sites, Levant Sothern". fas.harvard.edu. Retrieved 2014-10-01.
10.Jump up ^ Finkelstein, Israel, and Silberman, Neil Asher, 2001, The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology's New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts, p. 242
11.Jump up ^ Asherah: goddesses in Ugarit, Israel and the Old Testament, By Tilde Binger. Page 35
12.Jump up ^ "26 Religions". cs.utah.edu. Retrieved 2014-10-01.
13.Jump up ^ "MELCHIZEDEK - JewishEncyclopedia.com". jewishencyclopedia.com. Retrieved 2014-10-01.
14.Jump up ^ Frank Moore Cross: Canaanite myth and Hebrew epic: essays in the history of the religion of Israel. Harvard Univ Pr, 1997. P. 62f. Print. ISBN 978-0-674-09176-4
15.Jump up ^ Toorn 1996
16.Jump up ^ Segal, Alan F. Life after death: a history of the afterlife in the religions of the West
17.Jump up ^ Annette Reed (11 February 2005). "Life, Death, and Afterlife in Ancient Israel and Canaan" (PDF). Retrieved 2014-10-01.
18.Jump up ^ Wilkinson, Philip Myths & Legends: An Illustrated Guide to Their Origins and Meanings
19.Jump up ^ Aubet, Maria E., 1987, 910 "The Phoenicians and the West", (Cambridge University Press, New York) p.9
20.^ Jump up to: a b Tubb, Jonathan "The Canaanites" (British Museum Press)
21.Jump up ^ abstract, K. L. Noll (2007) "Canaanite Religion", Religion Compass 1 (1), 61–92 doi:10.1111/j.1749-8171.2006.00010.x
22.Jump up ^ Moscati, Sabatino. The Face of the Ancient Orient, 2001,
23.Jump up ^ Richard, Suzanne Near Eastern archaeology: a reader, Eisenbrauns illustrated edition (1 Aug 2004) ISBN 978-1-57506-083-5, p. 343
24.Jump up ^ Schaeffer, Claude F. A. (1936). "The Cuneiform Texts of Ras Shamra~Ugarit" (PDF). London: Oxford University Press. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2011-09-20.
25.^ Jump up to: a b Olmo Lete, Gregorio del (1999), "Canaanite religion: According to the liturgical texts of Ugarit" (CDL)
26.Jump up ^ Hillers D.R. (1985)"Analyzing the Abominable: Our Understanding of Canaanite Religion" (The Jewish quarterly review, 1985)
27.Jump up ^ The Encyclopedia of Religion - Mcmillan Library Ref. - Page 42
BibliographyMoscatti, Sabatino (1968), "The World of the Phoenicians" (Phoenix Giant)
Ribichini, Sergio "Beliefs and Religious Life" in Maoscati Sabatino (1997), "The Phoenicians" (Rissoli)
van der Toorn, Karel (1995). Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible. New York: E.J. Brill. ISBN 0-8028-2491-9.
Bibliography of Canaanite & Phoenician Studies


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Canaanite religion

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 This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (May 2008)



 The land of Canaan, which comprises the modern regions of Israel, the West Bank, Gaza Strip, Lebanon, Jordan and Syria. At the time when Canaanite religion was practiced, Canaan was divided into various city-states.
Canaanite religion is the name for the group of Ancient Semitic religions practiced by the Canaanites living in the ancient Levant from at least the early Bronze Age through the first centuries of the Common Era.
Canaanite religion was polytheistic, and in some cases monolatristic.


Contents  [hide]
1 Beliefs 1.1 Afterlife; Cult of the Dead
1.2 Cosmology
1.3 Mythology
2 History 2.1 The Canaanites
2.2 Influences
3 Contact with other areas
4 Hebrew Bible
5 Sources 5.1 Literary sources
5.2 Archaeological sources
6 See also
7 References

Beliefs[edit]



 Ba'al with raised arm, 14th-12th century BC, found at Ras Shamra (ancient Ugarit), Louvre
A great number of deities were worshipped by the followers of the Canaanite religion; this is a partial listing:
Anat, virgin goddess of war and strife, sister and putative mate of Ba'al Hadad
Athirat, "walker of the sea", Mother Goddess, wife of El (also known as Elat and after the Bronze Age as Asherah)
Athtart, better known by her Greek name Astarte, assists Anat in The Myth of Ba'al
Attar, god of the morning star ("son of the morning") who tried to take the place of the dead Baal and failed. Male counterpart of Athtart.
Baalat or Baalit, the wife or female counterpart of Baal (also Belili)
Ba'al Hadad (lit. master of thunder), storm god.
Baal Hammon, god of fertility and renewer of all energies in the Phoenician colonies of the Western Mediterranean
Dagon, god of crop fertility and grain, father of Ba'al Hadad
El Elyon (lit. God Most High) and El; also transliterated as Ilu
Eshmun, god, or as Baalat Asclepius, goddess, of healing
Ishat, goddess of fire. She was slain by Anat.[1][2][3]
Kotharat, goddesses of marriage and pregnancy
Kothar-wa-Khasis, the skilled, god of craftsmanship
Lotan, the twisting, seven-headed serpent ally of Yam
Marqod, God of Dance
Melqart, king of the city, the underworld and cycle of vegetation in Tyre
Molech or Moloch, putative god of fire[4]
Mot or Mawat, god of death (not worshiped or given offerings)
Nikkal-wa-Ib, goddess of orchards and fruit
Qadeshtu, lit. "Holy One", putative goddess of love.
Resheph, god of plague and of healing
Shachar and Shalim, twin gods of dawn and dusk, respectively. Shalim was linked to the netherworld via the evening star and associated with peace[5]
Shamayim, (lit. skies) the god of the heavens
Shapash, also transliterated Shapshu, goddess of the sun; sometimes equated with the Mesopotamian sun god Shemesh[6] whose gender is disputed[7]
Yam (lit. sea-river) the god of the sea and the river,[8] also called Judge Nahar (judge of the river).[9][10][11]
Sydyk, the god of righteousness or justice, sometimes twinned with Misor, and linked to the planet Jupiter[12][13]
Yahweh may exist as an ending of some Amorite male names,[14] though the only Canaanite mention of Yahweh, found on the Mesha Stele, refers to the god of Israel contrasted with Chemosh.[15]
Yarikh, god of the moon and husband of Nikkal
Afterlife; Cult of the Dead[edit]
According to Canaanite beliefs, when the physical body dies, the npš (usually translated as "soul") departs from the body to the land of Mot. Bodies were buried with grave goods, and offerings of food and drink were made to the dead to ensure that they would not bother the living. Dead relatives were venerated and sometimes asked for help.[16][17]
Cosmology[edit]
So far, none of the inscribed tablets found in 1929 in the Canaanite city of Ugarit (destroyed ca. 1200 BC) has revealed a cosmology. Any idea of one is often reconstructed from the much later Phoenician text by Philo of Byblos (c. 64–141 AD), after much Greek and Roman influence in the region.
According to the pantheon, known in Ugarit as 'ilhm (=Elohim) or the children of El, supposedly obtained by Philo of Byblos from Sanchuniathon of Berythus (Beirut) the creator was known as Elion, who was the father of the divinities, and in the Greek sources he was married to Beruth (Beirut = the city). This marriage of the divinity with the city would seem to have Biblical parallels too with the stories of the link between Melkart and Tyre; Chemosh and Moab; Tanit and Baal Hammon in Carthage.
From the union of El Elyon and his consort were born Uranus and Ge, Greek names for the "Heaven" and the "Earth".
In Canaanite mythology there were twin mountains Targhizizi and Tharumagi which hold the firmament up above the earth-circling ocean, thereby bounding the earth. W. F. Albright, for example, says that El Shaddai is a derivation of a Semitic stem that appears in the Akkadian shadû ("mountain") and shaddā`û or shaddû`a ("mountain-dweller"), one of the names of Amurru. Philo of Byblos states that Atlas was one of the Elohim, which would clearly fit into the story of El Shaddai as "God of the Mountain(s)." Harriet Lutzky has presented evidence that Shaddai was an attribute of a Semitic goddess, linking the epithet with Hebrew šad "breast" as "the one of the Breast". The idea of two mountains being associated here as the breasts of the Earth, fits into the Canaanite mythology quite well. The ideas of pairs of mountains seem to be quite common in Canaanite mythology (similar to Horeb and Sinai in the Bible). The late period of this cosmology makes it difficult to tell what influences (Roman, Greek, or Hebrew) may have informed Philo's writings.
Mythology[edit]
In the Baal cycle, Ba'al Hadad is challenged by and defeats Yam, using two magical weapons (called "Driver" and "Chaser") made for him by Kothar-wa-Khasis. Afterward, with the help of Athirat and Anat, Ba'al persuades El to allow him a palace. El approves, and the palace is built by Kothar-wa-Khasis. After the palace is constructed, Ba'al gives forth a thunderous roar out of the palace window and challenges Mot. Mot enters through the window and swallows Ba'al, sending him to the Underworld. With no one to give rain, there is a terrible drought in Ba'al's absence. The other deities, especially El and Anat, are distraught that Ba'al has been taken to the Underworld. Anat goes to the Underworld, attacks Mot with a knife, grinds him up into pieces, and scatters him far and wide. With Mot defeated, Ba'al is able to return and refresh the Earth with rain.[18]
History[edit]
The Canaanites[edit]
Main article: Canaanites
The Levant region was inhabited by people who themselves referred to the land as 'ca-na-na-um' as early as the mid-third millennium BCE.[19] There are a number of possible etymologies for the word.
Some[who?] suggest the name comes from the Semitic word "cana'ani", meaning merchant, for which the Phoenicians became justly famous.
The Akkadian word "kinahhu", however, referred to the purple-colored wool, dyed from the Murex molluscs of the coast, which was throughout history a key export of the region. When the Greeks later traded with the Canaanites, this meaning of the word seems to have predominated as they called the Canaanites the Phoenikes or "Phoenicians", which may derive from the Greek word "Phoenix" meaning crimson or purple, and again described the cloth for which the Greeks also traded. The Romans transcribed "phoenix" to "poenus", thus calling the descendants of the Canaanite settlers in Carthage "Punic".
Thus while "Phoenician" and "Canaanite" refer to the same culture, archaeologists and historians commonly refer to the Bronze Age, pre-1200 BC Levantines as Canaanites and their Iron Age descendants, particularly those living on the coast, as Phoenicians. More recently, the term Canaanite has been used for the secondary Iron Age states of the interior, that were not ruled by Aramaean peoples, a separate and closely related ethnic group which included the Philistines and the states of Israel and Judah.[20]
Influences[edit]
Canaanite religion was strongly influenced by their more powerful and populous neighbors, and shows clear influence of Mesopotamian and Egyptian religious practices. Like other people of the Ancient Near East Canaanite religious beliefs were polytheistic, with families typically focusing worship on ancestral household gods and goddesses, the Elohim, while acknowledging the existence of other deities such as Baal and El, Asherah and Astarte. Kings also played an important religious role and in certain ceremonies, such as the sacred marriage of the New Year Festival, may have been revered as gods. "At the center of Canaanite religion was royal concern for religious and political legitimacy and the imposition of a divinely ordained legal structure, as well as peasant emphasis on fertility of the crops, flocks, and humans."[21] [22]
Contact with other areas[edit]


 This section possibly contains original research. Please improve it by verifying the claims made and adding inline citations. Statements consisting only of original research should be removed. (January 2015)
Canaanite religion was influenced by its peripheral position, intermediary between Egypt and Mesopotamia, whose religions had a growing impact upon Canaanite religion. For example during the Hyksos period, when chariot-mounted maryannu ruled in Egypt, at their capital city of Avaris, Baal became associated with the Egyptian god Set, and was considered identical – particularly with Set in his form as Sutekh. Iconographically henceforth Baal was shown wearing the crown of Lower Egypt and shown in the Egyptian-like stance, one foot set before the other. Similarly Athirat (known by her later Hebrew name Asherah), Athtart (known by her later Greek name Astarte), and Anath henceforth were portrayed wearing Hathor-like Egyptian wigs.
From the other direction, Jean Bottero has suggested that Yah of Ebla (a possible precursor of Yam) was equated with the Mesopotamian god Ea during the Akkadian period. In the Middle and Late Bronze Age, there are also strong Hurrian and Mitannite influences upon the Canaanite religion. The Hurrian goddess Hebat was worshiped in Jerusalem, and Baal was closely considered equivalent to the Hurrian storm god Teshub and the Hittite storm god Tarhunt. Canaanite divinities seem to have been almost identical in form and function to the neighboring Aramaeans to the east, and Baal Hadad and El can be distinguished amongst earlier Amorites, who at the end of the Early Bronze Age invaded Mesopotamia.
Carried west by Phoenician sailors, Canaanite religious influences can be seen in Greek mythology, particularly in the tripartite division between the Olympians Zeus, Poseidon and Hades, mirroring the division between Baal, Yam and Mot, and in the story of the Labours of Hercules, mirroring the stories of the Tyrian Melkart, who was often equated with Heracles.
Hebrew Bible[edit]
See also: Category:Deities in the Hebrew Bible
El Elyon also appears in Baalam's story in Numbers and in Moses song in Deuteronomy 32:8. The Masoretic Texts suggest:
When the Most High (`Elyōn) divided to the nations their inheritance, he separated the sons of man (Ādām); he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the sons of Israel"
Sources[edit]
The sources for Canaanite religion are literary sources, mainly from Late Bronze Age Ugarit[23] and supplemented by biblical sources, and from archaeological discoveries.
Literary sources[edit]



 The ruins of the excavated city of Ras Shamra, or Ugarit.
Until the excavation of Ras Shamra in Northern Syria (the site historically known as Ugarit), and the discovery of its Bronze Age archive of clay tablet alphabetic cuneiform excavated by Claude F. A. Schaefer,[24] little was known of Canaanite religion, as papyrus seems to have been the preferred writing medium. Unlike in Egypt, where papyrus may survive centuries in the extremely dry climate, these have simply decayed in the humid Mediterranean climate.[25] As a result, the accounts contained within the Bible were almost the only sources of information on ancient Canaanite religion. This was supplemented by a few secondary and tertiary Greek sources (Lucian of Samosata's De Dea Syria (The Syrian Goddess), fragments of the Phoenician History of Philo of Byblos, and the writings of Damascius). More recently detailed study of the Ugaritic material, other inscriptions from the Levant and also of the Ebla archive from Tel Mardikh, excavated in 1960 by a joint Italo-Syrian team, have cast more light on the early Canaanite religion.[25][26]
According to The Encyclopedia of Religion, the Ugarit texts were one part of a larger religion, that was based on the religious teachings of Babylon. The Canaanite scribes that produced the Baal texts were also trained to write in Babylonian cuniform, including Sumerian and Akkadian texts of every genre.[27]
Archaeological sources[edit]
Archaeological excavations in the last few decades have unearthed more about the religion of the ancient Canaanites.[20] The excavation of the city of Ras Shamra and the discovery of its Bronze Age archive of clay tablet alphabetic cuneiform texts, helped provide a wealth of new information. More recently, detailed study of the Ugaritic material, other inscriptions from the Levant and also of the Ebla archive from Tel Mardikh, excavated in 1960 by a joint Italo-Syrian team, have cast more light on the early Canaanite religion.
See also[edit]
Ancient Semitic religion
Canaanism
List of Canaanite deities
Semitic neopaganism
References[edit]
Notes
1.Jump up ^ Gorelick, Leonard; Williams-Forte, Elizabeth; Ancient seals and the Bible. International Institute for Mesopotamian Area Studies. p.32
2.Jump up ^ Dietrich, Manfried; Loretz, Oswald; Ugarit-Forschungen: Internationales Jahrbuch für die Altertumskunde Syrien-Palästinas, Volume 31. p.362
3.Jump up ^ Kang, Sa-Moon, Divine war in the Old Testament and in the ancient Near East. p.79
4.Jump up ^ "alleged but not securely attested", according to Johnston, Sarah Isles, Religions of the Ancient World: A Guide. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. ISBN 0-674-01517-7. p.335
5.Jump up ^ Botterweck, G.J.; Ringgren, H.; Fabry, H.J. (2006). Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament 15 (v. 15). Alban Books Limited. p. 24. ISBN 9780802823397. Retrieved 2014-12-15.
6.Jump up ^ Johnston, Sarah Isles, Religions of the Ancient World: A Guide. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. ISBN 0-674-01517-7. P. 418
7.Jump up ^ Some authorities consider Shemesh to be a goddess, see Wyatt, Nick, There's Such Divinity Doth Hedge a King, Ashgate (19 Jul 2005), ISBN 978-0-7546-5330-1, p. 104
8.Jump up ^ Ugaritic text: KTU 1.1 IV 14
9.Jump up ^ "The Shelby White & Leon Levy Program: Dig Sites, Levant Sothern". fas.harvard.edu. Retrieved 2014-10-01.
10.Jump up ^ Finkelstein, Israel, and Silberman, Neil Asher, 2001, The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology's New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts, p. 242
11.Jump up ^ Asherah: goddesses in Ugarit, Israel and the Old Testament, By Tilde Binger. Page 35
12.Jump up ^ "26 Religions". cs.utah.edu. Retrieved 2014-10-01.
13.Jump up ^ "MELCHIZEDEK - JewishEncyclopedia.com". jewishencyclopedia.com. Retrieved 2014-10-01.
14.Jump up ^ Frank Moore Cross: Canaanite myth and Hebrew epic: essays in the history of the religion of Israel. Harvard Univ Pr, 1997. P. 62f. Print. ISBN 978-0-674-09176-4
15.Jump up ^ Toorn 1996
16.Jump up ^ Segal, Alan F. Life after death: a history of the afterlife in the religions of the West
17.Jump up ^ Annette Reed (11 February 2005). "Life, Death, and Afterlife in Ancient Israel and Canaan" (PDF). Retrieved 2014-10-01.
18.Jump up ^ Wilkinson, Philip Myths & Legends: An Illustrated Guide to Their Origins and Meanings
19.Jump up ^ Aubet, Maria E., 1987, 910 "The Phoenicians and the West", (Cambridge University Press, New York) p.9
20.^ Jump up to: a b Tubb, Jonathan "The Canaanites" (British Museum Press)
21.Jump up ^ abstract, K. L. Noll (2007) "Canaanite Religion", Religion Compass 1 (1), 61–92 doi:10.1111/j.1749-8171.2006.00010.x
22.Jump up ^ Moscati, Sabatino. The Face of the Ancient Orient, 2001,
23.Jump up ^ Richard, Suzanne Near Eastern archaeology: a reader, Eisenbrauns illustrated edition (1 Aug 2004) ISBN 978-1-57506-083-5, p. 343
24.Jump up ^ Schaeffer, Claude F. A. (1936). "The Cuneiform Texts of Ras Shamra~Ugarit" (PDF). London: Oxford University Press. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2011-09-20.
25.^ Jump up to: a b Olmo Lete, Gregorio del (1999), "Canaanite religion: According to the liturgical texts of Ugarit" (CDL)
26.Jump up ^ Hillers D.R. (1985)"Analyzing the Abominable: Our Understanding of Canaanite Religion" (The Jewish quarterly review, 1985)
27.Jump up ^ The Encyclopedia of Religion - Mcmillan Library Ref. - Page 42
BibliographyMoscatti, Sabatino (1968), "The World of the Phoenicians" (Phoenix Giant)
Ribichini, Sergio "Beliefs and Religious Life" in Maoscati Sabatino (1997), "The Phoenicians" (Rissoli)
van der Toorn, Karel (1995). Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible. New York: E.J. Brill. ISBN 0-8028-2491-9.
Bibliography of Canaanite & Phoenician Studies


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